Cold Comfort Castle
by Lord Goregore
Summary: ...And then again...
1. A Simple Plan

_**Cold Comfort Castle**_

Writer's Note: Hello. I'm Lord Goregore. As my small profile says, don't be worried about my name. It's misleading. If anyone wants me to explain it, I will. For now, story.

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Chapter 1: A Simple Plan

His name was Zackel Wintersoul, and it had seemed like a good idea at the time.

Why wouldn't it? After all, he'd survived excursions onto the Plaguelands, a festering land of poison and ruin that had left a lingering itch on his skin for several weeks after he'd left it. True, he hadn't exactly been on the front LINES of the Plaguelands, and the Plaguelands hadn't been quite as dangerous since Naxxramas had moved north to the freezing wastes of Northrend, but it was hardly a place for a vacation. Even with Kel'Thuzad's departure, legions of potent Scourge infested the place, and Zackel had not spent every day he'd been there in his tent playing Thrust. Oh, he wasn't about to march up to the Kirin Tor and tell them that their new shining prodigy had arrived, but he was a pretty strong mage. He hadn't even peaked yet, at that. He was perfectly right in his assumptions that he could have handled it.

Maybe he'd just been overwhelmed by the supposed brilliance of the idea. The Alterac Mountains were also a poor spot for a vacation, but they were also close to where the magical city of Dalaran had once been. With its abrupt transfer from the Eastern Kingdoms to Northrend, there was probably a good chance that a few stray magical artifacts had lost, or left behind, or broken off, or whatnot. And with the fact that most of the creatures that now resided in the area after the immensely poor choices of the former namesake city were unsavory to say the least, there was probably a chance that not all of them had been found, or had been found by people or creatures who had no idea what they now possessed. Yes, perhaps he wasn't the first to look through the mountains, but nothing ventured was nothing gained. If he'd always been timid, he never would have bartered with that nasty goblin and his even nastier-looking Forsaken bodyguard (who Zackel had sworn was foaming at the mouth, which had made him wonder if corpses could still contract diseases like rabies, which had led to a long argument with a dwarf in a tavern one night that had ended with the fact that dwarves drank alcohol like it was water and that Zackel _preferred _water allowing Zackel to pick up his gear and run out the door when the first punch had been thrown and the intoxicated patrons of the bar decided they all had numerous disagreements they had to work out with the guy or girl next to them) over the red-gemmed staff he'd carried for months, a staff that had turned out to be infused with considerable magic. Besides, he'd survived the Plaguelands. He could handle himself, provided he was careful.

Maybe it was the curse of who he was. He'd been a mischievous kid, with mischievous features. Age had forged those features into the wickedly glinted features of a rogue, but Zackel had found his skills lay in the mystical arts rather than stealth and assassination. The coming of the Scourge and all that had befallen Azeroth in the past several years had cast a hardened pall over his face, one that usually came out when things were going bad or when he was concentrating on his spells. Still, his rogue-worthy face had led to some saying that someone like him should not have become a magician. Zackel, had anyone actually had the courtesy to say these things about his face TO his face, would have given them a wordless response, his gesture saying enough.

Those that had supported him were enough. No matter what, or what had come.

Though perhaps it would have been good if they had been around. Left to his own devices, Zackel did what many would-be heroes on Azeroth did: he trained and worked towards the day he would cross the Dark Portal and test himself in the hellish landscapes of Outland (even if Illdian was dead, there was still much evil, and power, lurking in its shadows), and then perhaps return to sail to Northrend and confront the Scourge on their home territories. But to survive getting there, he would need more than his own strength and what his teachers could impart on him. He would need tools as well, tools of power and knowledge. And since he wasn't swimming in gold, he had to find other means to get them.

Besides, the snowy heights of Alterac was the perfect place to practice one of the crucial tasks all mages in Azeroth had been called upon to learn since the battle against evil had shifted to Northrend. He could look for hidden treasure and refine his training and skills at the same time. A piece of cake.

So Zackel had headed there, staff in hand, blue-silver robes covering his body (which annoyed him sometimes, as his feathered hair was also blue, and more than a few curious gnomes had followed him around asking him the secret of the 'head-merged armor'). And he hadn't taken his strength (or where he lacked it) for granted. He'd set things in motion _before _he'd headed into the ruins of Alterac. He also hadn't assumed that he could effortlessly outsmart the ogres that lived there. The Crushridge Clan had defied all the efforts of the criminal cartel who called themselves the Syndicate to drive them out, and the Syndicate had numbers on their side (even if by Zackel's standards they were mostly rabble. Rabble, however, could still easily stick a knife in your ribs or shoot an arrow in your throat if you forgot that they could do this, no matter what kind of control you had over the ancient forces of the world). Still, he'd survived the Plaguelands. As long as he didn't end up pissing off the whole clan, he could probably be in and out.

It had worked. Right up until the point that it hadn't.

Said point had presented itself by a fireball coming out of nowhere and blowing Zackel a dozen feet through the air before he impacted face-first into a snow bank. Worse, the wild magic attack was NOT calm, controlled, and quiet like the ones Zackel had been using to deal with the Crushridge ogres who he'd been unable to avoid. The end result was the alarm being raised.

The far-worse end (in Zackel's mind) result was what was happening now. Which was, after some frantic fleeing efforts, Zackel trapped against one of Alterac's old walls, surrounded by dozens of ogres. He'd driven the front-lines back with some quick, wild magic, but much to his surprise, they'd STAYED driven back instead of charging back into more magical attacks that might have made a hole for Zackel to escape. Their numbers had quickly swelled into said dozens, rendering the chances of such a hole appearing far more remote.

Zackel swallowed hard. He may have survived the Plaguelands, but this was probably worse than anything he'd seen on them. Also, he'd never been forced into a corner there. That was never a good situation to be in, whether you were wandering Stormwind or the Netherstorm.

The ogres chuckled nastily, turning weapons over in their hands and licking their lips. So much for the myth that all ogres were idiotic berserkers who wouldn't know an intelligent tactic if it jammed a dagger up their rears. Worse was the fact that Zackel had actually considered that factor. Just not enough. Food for thought, if Zackel didn't become food for the ogres.

And it had seemed like such a good idea at the time.

"…all right then." Zackel said. "This could be bad."

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Author's Note: Feedback would be appreciated.


	2. Yon Ill Wind

Chapter 2: Yon Ill Wind

Author's Note: If you like this story, tell your friends. I won't hold chapters hostage for reviews, but I do like my feedback.

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In better circumstances, Zackel would have been able to recall a variety of facts about the Crushridge Ogre Clan. Like that they had once been a part of the Stonemaul Clan, which now resided across the ocean in Kalimdor. Another fact was their leader, Mug'thol, had once been a servant to the Forsaken queen Sylvanas Windrunner before he had found something called the Crown of Will, which had allowed him to break the control she had over him and properly re-form his Ogres into the Crushridge Clan. The last, and most crucial fact, was that Forsaken agents had apparently been wanting to punish Mug'thol for his 'betrayal' for some time, and had sent a steady stream of various Horde 'applicants' to go enact said punishment from their base in Tarren Mills. No one had returned thus far, but the constant attacks had apparently thinned the Crushridge numbers some, which is why Zackel had decided to try his plan in the first place.

However, the current circumstances had only one mental process going on for the over-ambitious wizard, and that was the constant, rapid repetition of several words that all had to do with excrement. Had the Crushridge ogres attacked during that time, Zackel likely would have ended up like all the agents the Forsaken had sent up to the Alterac ruins.

However, they kept holding off, which gave Zackel the several seconds he needed to swallow some of his fear and get his power ready.

All right, they thought they had him pinned down and helpless. One quick storm of ice and a tactical trans-morph might give him an opening to run. Provided whatever threw the fireballs at him didn't do it again, but he would burn that bridge when he came to it. Better than it burning him.

"………SONTAR-HA…!" Zackel yelled, throwing his arm up.

Ogres were generally not preferential to projectile weaponry. It was either too small for them, or too complicated for them to figure out (more than one ogre had attempted to fire a bow by pulling on the string, not understanding that you actually needed an arrow for it to work. They had likely gone to their demise wondering about the mysterious magic that their enemies wielded). If they did use projectiles, it tended to be big rocks. Zackel could have handled a big rock.

A crossbow bolt was another story. Especially considering it was just ONE crossbow bolt, not several, which would have indicated several shooters (ogres, considering their barbaric mindset and likely-to-be-poor aim, seemed far more like to have a group firing of such weapons if they had them instead of one lone shooter). Later, Zackel wondered if he'd just been _really _unlucky, or if he'd underestimated the Crushridge Ogre Clan's intellectual abilities even more than he'd realized.

At the time, all he knew (besides a blur of motion and a slight whizzing crack that he was too slow to react to) was that something had buried itself in his wrist and nearly pinned his arm to the stone wall behind him. Zackel let out a scream of surprise and pain as he collapsed to his knees, his red staff thudding down in the compacted snow around him. The ogres around him roared laughter, as Zackel clutched his wounded limb, the crossbow bolt sticking out of his arm. Zackel hissed between his teeth and fought back a rush of tears.

"Heh hah ha. Stupid little man."

The grunting thunder made Zackel look up, as an ogre even larger than his fellows pushed his way to the front of the ranks. His sheer size and the way the other ogres parted before him would have been enough of an indication to Zackel who he was, but the small crown that sat crookedly around the prominent horn coming out of the top of his head clinched it.

"Think you so smart." Mug'thol chuckled, a massive length of wood in his hand. Zackel would have called it a club, except that it looked more like the giant ogre had pulled a small tree out of the ground and made do. "Think you can sneak around like bug, not get squashed. Ogres not stupid, YOU stupid!" Mug'thol laughed, the other ogres joining in.

"Not disagreeing with you at the moment." Zackel said, more to himself than as an answer. He groaned inwardly, and then swallowed his pride.

"What do you want of me, great Mugthol?" Zackel said, hoping he said the ogre's name right. Mug'thol looked confused for a moment, and Zackel tried to keep him that way. "If you wished me dead, surely your mighty clan would have long killed me! The fact that I am alive means you must wish something of me! It is only fair that I do it!"

"…you trying to trick Mug'thol!" The ogre chief said.

"No! I swear on my honor! I will not deceive or betray you! I shall aid you in whatever endeavor…uh, THING you wish for me to do!" Zackel said, and he meant it. If it kept him alive, there was a long list of things he was quite willing to do. Though there was also a list of things he would rather die than do, or be subjected to. He really hoped the wretched stories in that vein he had heard were just those.

Mug'thol stared a few more seconds, before emitting a nasty chuckle.

"Mug'thol not need help. Mug'thol strongest of all ogres! Why need little MAN?" Mug'thol declared, and the ogres around him cheered. "Mug'thol eat well, all those who come here. Mug'thol LIKE guests. Mug'thol…eat well."

With those words, Zackel realized there was no way he was going to talk the ogres into sparing him. With that factor clarified, he considered his options.

The first was to spontaneously manifest spider-like powers and climb up the wall behind him to freedom. Zackel considered this option to be extraordinarily unlikely, at best.

The second was to die. This option was more likely, but for obvious reasons he had a very strong opposition to it.

Which left him option three, his ace in the hole…and not considered until now because of the trouble it would cause. Not to mention it wasn't an instant-activation trick. He'd have to keep alive until it finally worked. That would not be easy.

But Zackel did not want to die. That was a strong motivation. There was also the fact he was in his element: he'd always been far better at manipulating ice than fire or arcane energies, and he was in a wintery, cold area. He could do this.

He'd kept the crossbow bolt from going into his wrist, after all. He hadn't been quick enough to dodge, but his innate sense that harm was coming to him had allowed his magic to manifest a shield of ice on his arm that the bolt had been stopped by. Zackel grinned fiercely to himself as the pain in his arm faded completely, said pain having come from the magical power that had surged through it to form the shield, rather than the bolt impaling into his body. Frost Armor. Had to love it.

Zackel put on a scared expression, pretending to retreat backwards and 'finding' that the wall behind him hadn't moved after all. The ogres roared more cruel laughter at his apparent fear, even as Zackel gestured behind his back, hoping none of the ogres noticed the motion as he drew runic symbol with his fingers, or the fact that his impaled arm was not bleeding.

"Come!" Mug'thol said, signaling with his tree-club. "Take him! Bring him alive! Like…feeling goop in skull squish beneath teeth."

Suddenly the reason the ogres had not killed him became horrifically clear to Zackel. Apparently, all the Forsaken agents who had not come back had given the ogre leader an eating preference: biting off, or rather down, on a creature's head while it was still living.

The good idea was looking worse all the time.

Much to Zackel's surprise, it somehow got even worse.

"MUG'THOL!" A voice came from the back of the ranks. The ogre leader paused, turning his head towards the noise. Zackel blinked, trying to identify who had spoken.

"HE LIES! HE PREPARES A TRICK! STOMP HIM! STOMP HIM!"

Zackel's mouth went dry as the voice roared out his warning. He still had no idea who was speaking: all he could see was a vague outline of what might have been black robes. A moment later, his focus was fully taken up by Mug'thol turning back around and bellowing.

Despite this, Zackel completed the final motion. He felt the chill in his fingers that confirmed that his process had been triggered.

All he had to do was survive until it fully manifested. Considering where he was, and the hopeful lack of any interference, he estimated that would take about seventy seconds.

Seventy seconds. Faced with a legion of angry ogres.

It had seemed like such a good idea at the time.

"YOU…!" Was all Mug'thor got out.

"SONTAR!" Zackel yelled, thrusting out his wounded hand. A bolt of icy cold flew out and true, smacking into Mug'thol's face and causing him to stumble back with a roaring snarl. In two swift motions, Zackel broke the crossbow bolt off of the ice armor on his wrist and snatched up his staff.

Seventy seconds. Only sixty-eight now. He could do this.

"SONTAR-HA!"

Ice instantly materialized above the ogres before him, raining down upon them in a fury of tearing shards. The ogres noisily made their displeasure clear, stumbling around and trying to both get away from the pain and attack the giver of it. Zackel charged towards the closest opening, and when an ogre moved to block him he aimed his staff and fired at its feet. Ice froze its appendages together at the ankle, causing the ogre to trip and fall short. Zackel quickly dashed around him.

A second later, a large rusty sword nearly took his head off. Zackel half-ducked and half stumbled, pushing off the broken ruins of what he thought was a chimney before he turned around and fired another bolt of ice into his attacker's chest. He heard Mug'thol bellowing, something about a 'muckrake' or what, and then another ogre was charging towards him with a spear.

A second later, a confused sheep was struggling in its cobbled together armor. Zackel felt a brief surge of relief flood his heart: he hadn't been sure he could get that to work. Seeing an opening, he dashed towards it, casting another storm of ice before him as he went. The falling shards veered away from him, but struck any ogres that got close.

He could do this. He could…

The fireball flew at him again.

The good news was, this time the confusion caused said fireball to smash into the back of an ogre instead of Zackel.

The bad news was that said ogre was thrown INTO Zackel, knocking him down with a painful crash. Zackel frantically rolled to the side before said accidentally-hit ogre came crashing down on top of him, scrambling to get up and hold onto his staff.

"CRUSH YOU!"

Zackel saw Mug'thol charging, and did the first thing that came to mind, thrusting up his hand as a wall of ice surged up from the snow between the two.

Mug'thol's smashing blow completely shattered the ice and glanced Zackel. Said glance was enough to toss him through the air like he weighed nothing. Mug'thol's bellow of triumph turned into a roar of rage as ice suddenly began racing up his club, swiftly jumping onto his arms. As the ogre leader yelled and tried to get the disabling ice off of his person, Zackel pushed himself up. He assessed that he was now back in the same rough spot as before.

"Okay…" Zackel said, a bit dazed as he tried to collect himself. "This could be…"

The ogre charging in cut Zackel off, and the mage surged up, his staff glowing blue as he both tried to fend off his attacker and find an escape route…

He vaguely saw the movement as the figure came down from above.

The axe bit deep, and the ogre shrieked as he tumbled forward onto his face. Zackel recoiled at the sudden change, eyes wide. Both at the giant, ugly wound on the ogre's back, and the person who now stood revealed behind the ogre.

Clad entirely in blackish-gray metal armor, the warrior stood out like a sore thumb against the white snow it had just spilled fresh blood on. Said blood contrasted better with the orange-ish red axe the warrior had used to nearly bisect the ogre from cranium to crotch. Even as Zackel stared, the warrior strolled up and buried the sharp blade at the end of the axe's hilt into the back of the ogre's head. The creature spasmed and then stopped moving.

"Bad?" Zackel finished.

The warrior briefly looked at Zackel. Who or what it was, the mage could not tell. A black metal face plate covered the warrior's features, and its armor betrayed little else beside that.

Another ogre charged in, roaring.

The warrior swung around and took the ogre's hand off at the wrist before Zackel could even point to warn it, and as the ogre bellowed the axe came whistling back and laid the ogre's throat open. More dark blood stained the snow, even as the warrior pushed the dying ogre aside and stalked towards the remaining ogres. Said ogres still numbered in the dozens. The warrior didn't seem to care an iota.

"CRUSH IT!" Came an order from somewhere, and the ogres charged towards the warrior. The warrior ducked under the first ogre blow and took its axe to said ogre's leg, before swinging the axe up and down into its head. The second ogre found its own axe slashed through like it was made out of paper before the warrior spun and took its head clean off. The third got its guts spilled out onto the ground before the warrior kicked the falling-to-its-knees ogre in the face to knock it back and screamed something incomprehensible to the ogres that remained.

Zackel stared for a second before he realized said yell was not wholly incomprehensible to him. It sounded somewhat familiar. Clearly not Common, the warrior was far too big to be a dwarf or a gnome, it didn't sound like Darnassian…

Glowing eyes. The warrior had glowing eyes. Zackel had seen them, briefly, when the warrior had looked at him. It was a Draenei.

One mightily-pissed-off sounding Draenei, as the warrior raised the axe to menace the ogres, daring the next one to make its move.

The ogres made said move. In the form of more crossbow bolts. Zackel gasped, as said bolts impaled themselves into the Draenei at several points.

The Draenei warrior staggered back, just a bit…and then with a snort of disgust, it slammed its axe down on the bolts, breaking and/or yanking them right out of its armor. Whatever it was made of, it was a lot harder than Zackel's humble cloth.

"…well gosh." Zackel said, as the Draenei warrior charged forward to the ogres. The next ogre who met the charge died just as violently as the last several. Several rapid-fire thoughts ran through Zackel's mind. Where the heck had this Draenei came from? What had the ogres done to it to make it so…eager? And…

The process. Somehow, Zackel had forgotten all about it. Zackel looked around, testing the air.

It was coming. Alone, Zackel had had a plan. But with the Draenei here…

"_TAKKOR CHI__'__BAH!__"_ The Draenei yelled, cleaving another ogre's arm off. Blood flew off the warrior's armor as it turned around, looking for the next ogre who would dare challenge. Sensing movement, it whirled around.

"WHOA! WAIT! GOOD GUY! YOUR SIDE!" Zackel yelled, staggering back before aiming and firing at a nearby ogre to try and reinforce that. The draenei's glowing eyes were a little harder to read then the norm, but Zackel was close enough to see the confusion, which swiftly disappeared under more aggression.

"_Rackalah mi__'__do charr, ghuyr wachall__…__!__"_

"Do you speak Common? We have trouble!" Zackel said. The Draenei didn't reply, instead turning and burying its bloody axe in the chest of another charging ogre, kicking the giant off the blade like it was an infant.

"Maybe _you _do." The Draenei said, speaking in Common this time. That fact let Zackel realize its gender: it was female.

"Look, you seem to be having fun and all…!" Zackel said, before he fired another bolt of ice into another ogre. His eyes darted around, looking for an exit…

And quickly coming to the cold realization there was none. Not in the time they had left.

"But we're about to having worse problems than ogres!" Zackel yelled. The Draenei ignored Zackel, as the one-armed ogre the warrior had created charged back in a mad frenzy and became a no-armed ogre after a quick dodge and chop.

"HEY! YOU!" Zackel yelled, getting in front of the Draenei. "BLIZZARD! COMING! COLD!"

"…what?" The Draenei said.

"THERE'S A BLIZZARD COMING! A BIG ONE!"

"Oh really. When?"

The buzzing in his teeth made Zackel look up at the angry grey clouds that had manifested over the past minute. Unnatural clouds, summoned by outside forces. Said outside forces being Zackel Wintersoul.

And due to the mess he'd found himself in, now completely out of Zackel's control.

"…now." Zackel said. A moment later, a horrendously cold wind slammed into the pair, even making the Draenei warrior stagger. And on its heels came the terrible, biting snow.

Zackel could not understand the last thing the Draenei warrior said as the mass of white consumed them both, but he had a strong feeling it had something to do with excrement.


	3. One Chance

Chapter 3: One Chance

The Alterac hold had seen better days, its gates permanently wedged open and various garbage and debris scattered around the immediate inside of the entrance. Anyone who could have looked from the inside of said entrance wouldn't have been able to compare the outside to it though: beyond the doors lay a solid wall of white. With as strong as the wind was howling, and how much snow was falling and consequently being blown through the open door, the immediate inside of the entrance of the Alterac hold would soon mirror the outside.

Zackel stumbled out of the blinding whiteout, barely able to pull the Draenei warrior along with him. He had no idea if she'd heard him over the shriek of the wind when he'd grabbed her and told her he was heading for shelter, but the fact he'd been able to actually guide her, rather then fight her on top of his confused sense of direction, the biting cold, and the considerable weight of the armor on the girl, indicated that she seemed to have listened to him somewhat. Blinking at finally having a vision radius of more than a centimeter, Zackel staggered into the inside of the keep and to the immediate side hallway to the left, finally getting out of the direct wind.

"Well that was an experience." Zackel said, wiping at his face for a moment before checking on the Draenei warrior. She'd managed to hold onto her axe in the escape, which was a good thing as far as Zackel was concerned: it looked expensive, at least. Unlike the mage, she was leaning against the wall with her free hand, looking down: apparently she was taking a longer time to get her bearings.

"Are you all ri-"

The Draenei answered two questions. One was whether she had her bearings. The other was whether she _needed _the axe. The answer to the two questions was yes, and no, as she whirled up, seized Zackel, and slammed him up against the wall with a bone-shuddering thud. Zackel wheezed air out of his lungs from the impact, air he could have used as the Draenei promptly seized him by the throat.

"What did you do out there?" The Draenei snapped in a low, dangerous tone.

"You can't…ah…"

"GIVE ME AN ANSWER." The Draenei said, and Zackel felt his feet leave the ground as she lifted him off it, one handed. The mage could swear he saw sparks literally shooting from the alien's glowing eyes, or maybe that was just the interesting colors that were starting to appear in his vision.

"Can't…breathe…" Zackel managed to get out.

The Draenei took her hand off Zackel's throat. Zackel came back down to earth, taking in a grateful gasp of air. He was about to say something, but didn't get the chance: no sooner had his feet fully settled back onto the ground then the Draenei had replaced it with the bladed point of one side of her axe.

"…actually I think the hand was better, can we go back to that?"

"You think you're clever." The Draenei said, and pushed the point in further. "I'm not amused."

Zackel swallowed, not liking the sensation when there was a point of hardened metal indented on his throat. The Draenei's eyes remained narrowed and pitiless.

"…please…just tried…to help…"

The Draenei held Zackel's gaze a second more before it grew more rational, the warrior withdrawing the axe point and stepping back. Zackel leaned against the wall, clutching his throat as he took slow, deep breaths.

"My apologies. Maybe I…"

Zackel yanked his staff up, a quick verbalization accompanying the blast of ice from it. A moment later the flat size of the Draenei's axe slammed against the side of Zackel's head, nearly knocking him silly as he fell to his knees.

"You DARE…?!" The Draenei yelled, before she heard the thud behind her and whirled around. The ogre, having taken a blast of pointed ice right to the knee to knock him to the ground, was easily dispatched by an axe blow to the head.

The Draenei looked at the corpse for a bit, before looking back at Zackel. He'd been firing at the ogre. She'd reacted on instinct, and nearly crushed the mage's skull for his aid.

Zackel, much to his surprise, had recovered from the swipe the Draenei had laid into him a lot quicker than he would have expected in the immediate seconds after getting smacked with it. Maybe she hadn't got her full strength behind the hit.

"…sorry." Zackel wheezed. "Saw shape…couldn't warn…throat…"

"…are you all right?" The Draenei said, heading over and helping Zackel up, the cold tone in her voice finally fading some.

"Think so…ow." Zackel said, touching his head. He was going to have one hell of a goose egg there if he didn't do something about it. "We need to…close the gate. More ogres could stumble over the entrance, and I'd rather not be driven into the building and have to fight who knows how many desperate, angry ogres. Even IF you seem to be very good at it."

"You're not wrong." The Draenei said, hefting her axe as she peered around.

"Controls should be nearby…provided they work…" Zackel said, looking around himself. The ogre's ability to light the abandoned fortress was less than optimal, but after a few minutes of looking around, the pair had managed to locate some switches in a nearby room. Said room was about as clean as the entrance, having long been plundered by the ogres who lived there. Worse, the switches refused to move.

"_Ki__'__tor.__"_ The Draenei said, after several unsuccessful attempts to get the lever to work. "Jammed fast."

"Here let me try…something…" Zackel said, putting his staff aside as he reached into his cloaks. He took another minute to fish out a small bag of powder and a flask. Dumping the powder on the rusted switch, Zackel poured the contents of the flask onto it in turn and rubbed the combination into the contraption.

"Whu-ter."

A brief spark of energy flickered over the switch. Zackel tried to pull it. This time, it worked: the sound of the gate falling rang down the hallway in a dull echo. Zackel pulled a secondary switch and was rewarded with another, similar noise.

"Ah. Gnomish engineering and magical know-how. Sometimes I even amaze…myself…" Zackel said, turning around and trailing off as the Draenei warrior looked at him, wearing an expression, as best Zackel could tell, of annoyed boredom. "And you clearly don't care."

"You really are amazing." The draenei said, the sarcasm in her voice so thick it could have been used to seal cracks in stone.

"Right…okay." Zackel said, picking up his staff and heading down the hallway to check the door. The metal gate was closed, or that was what Zackel assumed, as another, wooden door had come down in front of it, from Zackel's perspective that is. Zackel checked the wood, finding it in surprisingly good condition.

"Okay, now the unpleasant part. We have to go through the fortress, get rid of any unwanted guests. I think most if not all of the clan had come out when you…came along to assist me, but there might be a straggler or three. Once we clear those out…"

"What are you talking about?" The Draenei said.

"Pardon?"

"You're a mage. Get us out of here."

"…pardo-?"

"USE A PORTAL YOU ADDLE-BRAINED PAPERSACK." The Draenei said. "And don't think you're being compensated for it either."

"…oh." Zackel said, his eyes slowly trailing upward at an angle as he lightly ground his teeth together. "Ah well, this is going to be embarrassing…"

"What?"

"I…don't have any Runes of Portals."

"…_What?__"_

"I can't create a safe transport unless I have runes. Otherwise we're far more likely to end up…"

Zackel found himself being slammed against the wall again, or rather the wooden door he'd brought down across the entrance.

"YOU WANDERED OUT HERE WITHOUT ANY PORTAL RUNES?! ARE YOU A COMPLETE IDIOT?!" The Draenei warrior yelled.

"Can we not do this again?" Zackel squeaked. The Draenei let Zackel go, her glowing eyes smoldering with fury. "You're right, I'm an idiot. I'd likely be dead if it wasn't for you too. But that's just how the situation stands. We should try and make the best of it."

The Draenei glared for another moment, before she spun around and stalked off, axe at the ready. Zackel sighed to himself and followed.

"By the way, I'm Zackel Winter…"

"Don't care." The Draenei warrior said. "Don't get in my way, or I'll chop through you to get to the ogres. Fel, if I don't feel better in a few minutes, I might do that anyway, ogres or no ogres."

Zackel groaned to himself. This was going to be a fun experience, he could tell.

And it had seemed like such a good idea at the time.


	4. Groundwork

Chapter 4: Groundwork

In the chaotic and dangerous world of Azeroth, it was always a good thing to find yourself a companion or two. It beat staring down a gigantic bear alone, or sleeping with your back to a tree after taking the gamble of whether a campfire would keep wild creatures and/or monsters away or cause them to notice you whereas before they would not have done so if you hadn't done something like light a campfire. Of course, this also meant you could get shot in the back so the bear would have something to chew on while your 'companion' prepared to kill the beast, or that you would wake up in your underwear with all your gear stolen (if you woke up at all). Such was life.

It was generally thought, though, that Draenei were trustworthy. Well, more trustworthy then some of the people Zackel had traveled with in his adventures. Like a twitchy-looking gnome who babbled interesting stories around the campfire about armies of noble werewolves who would one day emerge from Silverpine Forest to lay siege to the Molten Core. Draenei, on the other hand, were the last remains of their kind, fleeing the Burning Legion after suffering so much at its hands, noble servants of the Light who would gladly lead the charge for justice no matter where it went.

This Draenei warrior was leading the charge, but Zackel was pretty sure she didn't want justice. She wanted something to hack until it stopped moving and/or emitting liquid. Despite that, Zackel was pretty sure that she wouldn't be planning to follow up on her threats towards him.

Pretty sure.

He'd been pretty sure about _the plan _as well. He wondered how many more times that was going to pop up and mock him.

Still, once she'd stalked away from him for several seconds, the Draenei's stance and posture changed, and she began making her way along at a slightly slower and much more cautious pace. Zackel watched her for a bit, recognizing it as discipline. She'd been tasked with something, and she planned to do it, and do it well. That was also better than some of the people Zackel had worked with.

After doing it for a few seconds, Zackel quickly realized his watching of her could be construed as him staring at her rear, and he quickly averted his eyesight in another direction. Not like he could see anything with all the armor the Draenei was wearing. Even the tails the alien supposedly had was out of sight, presumably tucked away somewhere safe. Zackel idly wondered where for a few seconds, and then quickly abandoned that line of thought. For all he knew, Draenei had psychic powers. Or were very good at reading faces. Or maybe she didn't even have a tail. Or maybe he should wonder why he was locked in this strange circular pondering. There were more important things to do.

With that possible misunderstanding stopped before it began, Zackel continued after the Draenei as the two went ogre hunting. It proved to be a wise move, as exploring the rooms and stairways of the very dirty and bad-smelling fortress did turn up a few stray ogres. They met a quick end via axe and staff, the Draenei again doing most of the work.

"So, can I ask…"

"Quiet." The Draenei said, approaching a door next to a flight of battered wooden stairs. "Basement level."

"You want to go down first?"

"Why? So I can be your meat shield?" The Draenei said, looking at Zackel.

"In all honesty yes. I saw you shrug off those arrows. I figure you'd be better served to face an ambush than me."

The Draenei cocked her head at Zackel, and for a moment Zackel wondered if she was going to see if anything was in the basement by throwing him down the stairs into it.

"Might not have to go down." The Draenei said, turning away from the door and heading towards the freshly-killed ogre corpse that was cooling down the hallway.

"Oh?"

"Been around. Know how ogres think. If you're not in the Blade's Edge Mountains anyway." The Draenei said, and with one swift downward cleave she hacked the ogre's head off. "Ogres don't like it if an outsider kills one of their clan and uses it to question their own strength. Going down into the basement could leave us vulnerable. However…"

The Draenei returned to the door, holding the ogre's head in one hand.

"If there are any actually down there, then any grown ogre worth his salt won't be able to resist this."

With one ferocious kick, the Draenei knocked the door open into the basement.

"THIS IS WHAT I THINK OF YOU WORTHLESS OGRES! YOU ARE ALL AS PATHETIC AS HE!" The Draenei yelled, hurling the ogre's head into the dark below. Zackel blinked.

"…Are you…"

A bellowing roar came from the basement, and the Draenei stepped back, taking her axe in both hands.

"Something ogres don't realize about charges to answer insults against their strength."

Said answering ogre crashed up through the stairs, trying to squeeze through the door and swing its own axe at the warrior at the same time. The Draenei nimbly dodged the blow, and actually waited a moment for the ogre to fully get itself out of the doorway. Zackel didn't know if she was being honorable or just taking her time to set up her attack.

It seemed to be the latter, as the ogre's second swing buried itself in the wall, the Draenei ducking under the attack and nearly carving the ogre's leg off with her own axe. The ogre screamed in pain, a scream that cut off as the Draenei whirled around and slammed her axe into the falling ogre's face, almost splitting its skull in half.

"They tend to work better when they're not alone. And done…"

The second bellow sounded in the Draenei's ears, and she turned left towards the second ogre charging down the hallway.

A blast of ice flew over her shoulder, forming into a crystal spear that impaled through the second ogre's chest. It crashed down at the Draenei's feet. She stared at it a moment, and then slammed her axe's pointed hilt into its head as well.

"I could have handled that."

"Just in case." Zackel said. "That was a nice technique though."

"Hard-earned." The Draenei said. "Ice up the floor here, would you? I'm going to shove the ogre's body down and repeat the challenge."

"How long should we wait?"

"Ogres aren't patient." The Draenei said, as Zackel did as she asked. Despite walking on the ice he'd formed, Zackel noticed the Draenei didn't lose her footing at all.

Tossing the ogre body down and repeating the challenge garnered no immediate response. The Draenei waited, and then dragged and threw the second ogre body down the stairs, without too much apparent effort either time. That got no response either.

"It's clear. Let's move on." The Draenei said, heading for the stairs next to the basement door.

"You sure?"

"You can go down there and check if you want." The Draenei said, in a tone more appropriate for talking to a child. Zackel glanced at the open door, but in the end closed it and followed after the warrior.

When they came back down the stairs to do a quick secondary sweep, the door remained closed. Somehow, Zackel wasn't much surprised.

* * *

The sun had begun setting (though the Alliance members didn't actually know that) by the time Zackel and the Draenei settled down into the best room in the fortress they could find: a large central room on the upper levels. It came with a fireplace, two braziers for lighting, crudely stacked wood along one wall for said fireplace, and the most intact furniture in the building. From what Zackel could tell, it was probably where Mug'thol had made his quarters. It even smelled better than most of the fortress, though that wasn't saying much. The pair's explorations had only turned up one more ogre, who'd died quickly to an ice projectile through the eye. With his demise, and their follow-up sweep, they had been able to roughly classify the Alterac stronghold as 'safe'. True, they hadn't been able to explore the two main stairwells that lead to the fort's roof, mainly because the ogres had either broken or taken the doors off the actual exit to the outside at the top of the stairs, and enough snow had piled up at the entrance and on the stairs to not make it worth the hassle. If no ogres had come down those stairs when the storm had started and by the time the mage and warrior had ventured along, they wouldn't be coming down at all.

"Can you clean this?" The Draenei said, peering up the chimney, a pile of snow having gathered on the remains of the last fire.

"Clean and better. I can probably arrange something to prevent any more snow falling on our fire. I also happen to be a decent alchemist." Zackel said.

"Is that needed? How long can this storm last?" The Draenei replied, ignoring Zackel's subtle bragging again.

Zackel really wished he hadn't fallen silent. The Draenei quickly noticed, swiveling around to look at the wizard once more.

"…first of all, you have to promise not to slam me into the wall again."

"…you _DID_ do this! I was just angry before but you _actually__…__!_" The Draenei said, stalking towards Zackel.

"Hey! Whoa! Wait! I had no idea you were around before you dropped out of the sky and started playing Whack-A-Ogre! I was trying to survive!" Zackel protested. It did not stay the Draenei, who marched right up to Zackel to glare into his eyes. It was around then Zackel noticed how tall she was: he was far from short himself, but she had two inches at him at least.

"What. Did. You. Do." The Draenei said.

"If I tell you, are you going to hit me?"

"Probably. I'll hit you more if you don't."

Zackel swallowed again.

"Okay, okay. I activated a rune manifestation called the Song of Storms. It pumped arcane energies into the atmosphere that manipulated temperature and pressure to create an intense, constant blizzard." Zackel said, and drew in a long, slow breath. This was going to suck. "However, having not been able to direct the release when I triggered it, I lost control of it. Without another mage performing a suitably potent counter-spell, the mystical energies will continue to maintain the storm conditions far longer than it would occur in nature."

"…how long?"

"…Several weeks."

The Draenei started raising her axe.

"I'M SORRY! I DIDN'T MEAN IT!" Zackel yelled, throwing up his hands. "I was going to use the storm and my specialty to escape! I didn't know you were here!"

"…True. You didn't." The Draenei said. "That spares you the axe."

"Thank you."

The Draenei stomped on Zackel's foot.

"OW! THAT WASN'T MUCH BETTER!" Zackel said, hopping around.

"Speak for yourself." The Draenei said, turning and walking towards a dirty table, as she began picking over its contents. "Believe me, I want to do worse. What with your blizzard, and your lack of portal runes. Idiotic mage."

"Trust me, my day didn't turn out how I wanted either." Zackel said. "Well…look on the bright side. We won't starve. I might be lacking Runes of Portals, but I have other supplies. With what you have…"

"Which is virtually nothing." The Draenei said.

"…what? You don't have any supplies? Why?"

"Because of you STUPID MAGES." The Draenei growled, turning her blazing eyes towards Zackel. Zackel took a step back, before he realized her tone was different. She didn't seem to be talking to him, or about him.

"…okay. Okay. Right. All right. What we don't have, I can make. I have camping supplies, medicinal supplies, other things stored in my bags, thank you magical enchanted carrying capacity…" Zackel said. "I'm not strong enough for my spell to maintain constant snowfall. It'll dump snow for about a day or two, and then spent the rest blowing it around. Hell, another wizard could wander by and dispel it tomorrow."

"Perhaps you'd better hope that happens." The Draenei said. Having cleared the table to her satisfaction, she reached up to her face. A few subtle motions undid the face-mask she wore, and she turned and placed it on the table. Reaching up, she slipped her helmet off, carefully sliding it down and off her horns.

It was that motion that made the images come.

_Fire__…_

_Screaming__…_

_That red, mocking mouth__…_

"Mage? Mage! Snap out of it. We have accommodations to work out."

Zackel blinked, once again back in the Alterac hold. The Draenei was looking at him, her face exposed. She had blueish-purple skin, her shoulder length hair a blend of black and silver, long bangs of it tucked over the front of her horns, which curved along the length of her cranium before tilting up at the top. Her features would have been quite lovely if she hadn't looked so cross.

"…accommodations?" Zackel said.

"You got me stuck in here with you. You are damn sure going to work it off."

* * *

"_First of all, give me your food. All of it.__"_

"_My food?__"_

"_All your natural, prepared food.__"_

"_I can__…"_

"_I know you can manifest food. YOU can eat that. If I wanted to eat your mage foods, I might as well go eat the snow outside for all the good it would do me.__"_

"_Our provisions are__…"_

"_Don__'__t care. These negotiations have one rule. I make them.__"__ The Draenei said. __"__Second, you said you had camping gear. Do you have furs, blankets, cloaks, whatnot?__"_

"_Yes__…"_

"_Give me those as well. YOU can sleep with the stinking ogre bedding.__"_

"_Right then. Shall I arrange a schedule for your daily armor polishing next, my good lady?__"_

"_You haven__'__t SEEN me in a bad mood, wizard. I heavily suggest you avoid it.__"__ The Draenei said. __"__Now, we__'__re going to go back down into the lower levels. First we__'__re going to find everything we can scavenge. Well, first we__'__re going to dump all the corpses of those ogres into the basement, but you know what I mean. Once we__'__ve found everything we can, you__'__re going to bring it up here. And when you__'__re done that, you__'__re going to go around and lay your little mage traps on every single door there is. I__'__m not having any ogres sneak in here, and if any do I__'__ll beat them to death with your body.__"_

"…_that will take__…"_

"_As long as it takes. You WILL do it.__"__ The Draenei said. __"__And don__'__t try anything cute when setting your traps. If you rig them to goose me or something for revenge or whatnot, I__'__ll clean the floor with your face.__"_

"_Shall I make a whip for you, draenei? Just to complete this whole illusion of slavery?__"_

"_You__'__re still not funny, wizard.__"__ The Draenei said. __"__I saved your life, and you greatly inconvenienced me. I have places to go, and instead I__'__m stuck here with you. So you can do it, or I can convince you. And as you have seen, I can be VERY convincing.__"_

_The look she__'__d given him as she__'__d finished was all the convincing Zackel needed. He__'__d sighed inwardly, and gotten to work.

* * *

_

The Draenei hadn't sat around watching him, though. She'd actually helped a lot more than he'd expected. He'd still had to carry more than half of the salvaged items upstairs, and laying all the traps and warnings had been even more exhausting. Zackel had tolerated it by making it a training exercise. Practice made perfect. It probably would have made this day go better, if he'd had more of it.

The Draenei was sitting by the newly set fire in the hearth when he returned, eating one of his roasted quails; she did not offer to share. Zackel felt his stomach growl, and with another sigh he prepared his own meal, quite literally. He had to admit, conjured sourdough bread did lack something compared to normal food, but it filled him and gave him the nutrients he needed.

"…how would you have escaped if I hadn't shown up?" The Draenei abruptly asked as Zackel was chewing on one of his mouthfuls.

"…from the ogres?" Zackel said after swallowing.

"No from the murlocs with wings, yes the ogres." The Draenei said.

"…well, as said…survive until the Song triggered. It caused near-whiteout conditions. I was going to use my mage abilities to regulate my body temperature and use the winds as a guide to get out of Alterac. Which is why I can't do that now. It only works with me. You could freeze to death. Probably would, who knows how long I'd be wandering around trying to get specific bearings while hoping my powers kept me alive. Fel, it might be worse for you. Don't Draenei come from a warm place?"

"What's THAT supposed to mean?" The Draenei said, her voice dipping into low, dangerous territory. If Zackel had taken another bite, he might have choked on his food. The Draenei had been irritated and/or cross before, but now she sounded genuinely offended.

"Nothing! I just…well I've heard some things about your home and…"

"Whatever. I can handle the cold." The Draenei said, and promptly gave Zackel the cold shoulder again, not saying anything else as she cleaned up her food, took off her armor (which took a while: it was elaborate armor) and rolled herself up in his blankets to sleep. Zackel had tried not to look at her as she did so, busying himself in categorizing the items the Draenei hadn't taken from him.

He thought he'd doze off after that, but instead he'd found himself too tired to sleep. Instead, he watched the fire, occasionally adding a log.

He'd been watching it for several minutes before the memories of what had happened when he'd seen the Draenei's face came back. It had been a while since he'd had them.

Probably understandable why. Though he doubted the Draenei would understand. Putting said memories back into a mental box, Zackel began meditating to recharge his mental batteries.

He'd been doing that for a bit before he noticed the Draenei's stirring. He found himself drawn to it, observing and assessing the motion. When he figured it out, he couldn't help but smirk. The Draenei was cold.

He wasn't much surprised. She'd demanded his clean furs and whatnot for bedding, but by the basis of who he was, he didn't need blankets as much as some people did (some dwarves had once asked him if he had any of their race in his family tree), and hence he'd reduced the thickness of his personal materials to save room. Beneath her armor, the Draenei had worn an under-layer of thin leathers: he suspected all the sweat the Draenei had emitted had likely been absorbed by it and was catching the cold air in the not-exactly-super-insulated fortress. And while he was stuck with the unpleasant materials the ogres had used for bedding, they were considerably thicker. And Zackel, being an aspiring alchemist as well as a mage and a dabbler in gnomish engineering, had a pair of nose plugs.

And of course, Draenei came from a warm place. Maybe.

Zackel didn't enjoy the Draenei's discomfort long, though. As rude as she was about it, she was stuck with him because of his actions. That, and if she slept poorly, she likely would be in an even fouler mood the next day. That, and…

"Damn it Zackel." Zackel groused, and removed his nose plugs to begin the very unpleasant process of smelling his bedding. After several minutes and a few retches, Zackel had located the least-offense part of the ogre's furs. Standing up, he dragged it over to the alien. He considered just dropping it on her, and then decided he didn't want her jumping up and punching him due to a mistaken attack. Kneeling down, he began placing the fur on her.

He never saw her move. He also never saw exactly where she got the knife. All Zackel knew was that suddenly the Draenei was up, holding his hair in one hand and pressing the small dagger against his throat with the other.

"WHAT. ARE. YOU. DOING." The Draenei said, her voice back in that same low, dangerous tone.

For the first time, true, genuine fear flooded through Zackel's body. He was trying to help a lunatic. He'd survived the ogres just to get killed by an act of altruism.

"…cold?" Zackel half-whispered, half-begged.

The Draenei held her harsh expression for another second, before a surge of emotions washed across her features. Zackel could almost swear that she recoiled when she took the knife away. He quickly reared back, falling onto his butt as he scrambled away.

The Draenei looked at the fur, and then the knife. The light of the fires and the brazier gave her skin a slight shimmering effect, which Zackel noticed more due to his high-alert state than anything else.

"…I'm sorry." The Draenei said, putting the knife down. "You didn't deserve that…you didn't deserve any of my crap. I just…" The Draenei said, sighing. "It's been a very bad day."

"No _fooling_." Zackel said.

"No, wait." The Draenei said, looking up. "Please don't retreat into bitter sarcasm. We have to stand each other's company for a time, I'd rather not spend it at each other's throats."

"…okay, who are you, and what did you do with the other Draenei?" Zackel blurted out. He closed his eyes with a wince as the softness that had come over the Draenei's face vanished, the familiar acerbity returning.

"Have trouble controlling your tongue, don't you human."

"Some have said that." Zackel said, opening his eyes. "My turn. Sorry. You're right."

"Come here." The Draenei said, gesturing with a hand. Zackel pushed himself up, semi-crawling back over to the Draenei as she checked the blanket she'd given him before turning her gaze back in his direction.

"I'm Rielle." The Draenei said, offering her hand.

"…Zackel Wintersoul." Zackel said, taking Rielle's hand. She had a surprisingly soft grip. "My friends call me Kel."

"Nice to meet you…Zack." The Draenei said with a mildly cold and wry expression.

"This is for my last comment, isn't it."

"Mmmm-hmmmm." Rielle said, removing her hand as she gathered up her blankets again. "Get some sleep. Tomorrow you're going to use those fancy mage powers to clean out those stairwells. Then you're going to go out on the roof and make sure it doesn't get so weighed down with snow that it doesn't collapse on our heads. And while you're up there, you can try and stop this damn blizzard. Yes, you said you can't. You're still going to TRY. And then maybe we'll do some other work. I'm not sitting on my rear end counting the cracks in the wall while we're housed here."

"Right…" Zackel said, getting up and heading to his own bedding. "Joy."

"Don't make me wake you up at the crack of dawn, Zack."

"How would you even TELL?"

"I'm good at these sorts of things."

"Why do I suspect that anything that makes my life difficult you'll be good at?" Zackel murmured to himself, shrugging off his robe before he climbed into bed.

"I heard that."

"Oh damn it I thought those were horns, not ears."


	5. The Secret Diary of Zackel Wintersoul

Chapter 5: The Secret Diary of Zackel Wintersoul, Age 24

Journal Entry No # 429

_Had clever plan. Plan was not so clever after all. V. Annoyed._

_Not dead. There's that, at least._

_Stuck in old abandoned castle used by ogres as home. Ogres really poor on hygiene. True, I doubt I smell much better to uptight noses, but at least I try and keep clean. Swear ogres also use bedding as toilet materials._

_Could be worse. Could double-use toothbrush as such. Really wish I hadn't heard that story._

_Companion is Draenei who came out of nowhere. Still have no clue why. Draenei is not forthcoming. Wonder if it is that time. Wonder if Draenei have that time. Wonder if there is any way I can inquire without getting killed._

_Tasked into service by Draenei as free labor. Giant pain. Staff not meant to be used as snow shovel. Also very hard to shovel snow up it-packed stairs. Thank light for magic powers._

_Tried to stop blizzard. Failed. Expect this to repeat. Draenei not listen._

_On second thought, think it might be preferable if the unpleasant mystery on furs IS of the bathroom variety._

_Seemed like such good idea. Hate life. Bet this never happened to Jasciona.

* * *

_

One thing about armor sets was that they looked very strange when half-assembled. Zackel would have found Rielle's training exercises comical as a result, if he wasn't very worried about what chuckling at her could cause. While he went about the business of clearing a way up the stairway and then cleaning snow off the roof, she'd stayed in their 'quarters', dressed in her armor's chest, leg, shoulder, and helmet pieces, and performed constant combat repetitions with her axe. The little Zackel had seen made him wonder how it helped: the process was a lot slower and more restricted than the wild albeit directed blows she'd used to so effectively bring down ogres twice her size and thrice her weight. Of course, she was a lot stronger than she looked: Zackel had seen this firsthand. Not only could she down ogres, she had had no problem moving several hundred pounds of dead weight. Considering she wasn't bulging with massive muscles, instead possessing a lithe, tightly packed figure, Zackel figured she had exceptional tendon strength. Which was probably one of the reasons she had chosen a career that had involved becoming so good at swinging an axe into people's faces.

"I recognize the markings on your armor." Zackel said as Rielle finished up a set. She glanced at the wizard, who had an open notebook he was jotting things down in. With the alien not saying anything, he looked back up at his erstwhile 'roommate'. "Marks of the Northrend Vanguard. You're part of the assault against Arth…The Lich King."

"Yes." Rielle said, before turning and going back to her practice. "The Alliance greatly aided me and my people on our former home. It will never be the same, but they helped make it a better place. Their efforts ensured my survival and growth. When they called on my…my people to help them in their effort against the Lich King, we could hardly refuse."

"How is that going?"

"Uncertain. The front is spread greater than expected. Meeting…unexpected opposition." Rielle said. "My primary effort this past month has been securing a mine rich in resources. We're not the only ones who want it. Fighting has been quite heavy."

"The Scourge?"

"The Horde." Rielle said.

"Ah, but of course." Zackel said. Silence settled onto the room again.

"…did the Wrathgate…"

The axe did not actually go anywhere near Zackel, but the way Rielle turned and threw it across the room and into the wall served terrifyingly well enough.

"Let's not talk about the Wrathgate." Rielle said, stalking across the room and pulling her axe free.

"Sorry."

"Not your fault…not your…" Rielle said. She headed over to her own bedding, placing her axe down before she drank some of Zackel's juice.

"So you were at Northrend."

"Yes."

"………….then may I ask why you are now he…"

Rielle glanced up, her eyes filled with cold anger. Again, Zackel got the impression it wasn't directed at him.

"…would you like to decide the conversation direction, so I can stop inadvertently poking sore spots?"

"What are you writing down?"

"Alchemist ponderings."

"Oh really." Rielle said, before abruptly surging up and grabbing for the book.

"HEY! That's PRIVATE!" Zackel said, pulling the book away.

"And I'm bored. Hand it over!"

"You wouldn't understand it!"

"Try me!" Rielle said, grabbing at the book.

"Fine, fine." Zackel said, handing it over. Rielle looked at the wizard, and then glanced at the book. As Zackel had said, it was filled with confusing mathematical formulas.

"…you pulled something."

"What?"

"You switched the books somehow. Let me see up your sleeves!"

Zackel pulled the sleeves of his robe back, revealing shirted arms and nothing hidden.

"…why would you bother trying to protect this?"

"Would you like it if I started examining the metallurgy of your helmet?"

"…point." Rielle said, heading back to her bedding. She sat for a moment, before she took her armor off and laid down on the furs.

"So. Tell me what you were doing here." Rielle said.

"You mean in the Alterac mountains?"

"I might as well know why I'm stuck here with you."

"Well, you see, it seemed like a good idea at the time."

* * *

Journal Entry No # 430

_She thought the idea was v. stupid. Not really in a position to argue._

_More clever than she thinks. Up sleeves is first place anyone with sense looks. Sleight of hand is crucial part of learning magic. Easier to summon power from nothing when one has learned to move things without anyone seeing them._

_She snores when she sleeps. Almost cute._

_Have to move more snow tomorrow. Looks to be daily task._

_Hate daily tasks.

* * *

_

"So how do these traps work?" Rielle asked, peering at the faint, barely visible marks Zackel had etched on the sides of the door and the floor where the actual door was. Zackel had been perusing a damaged book he'd found in one of the rooms when she'd stumbled over him. Zackel didn't know if she'd been meaning to ask or just did so so he'd be occupied with a task of her choosing.

"Well there's details about ley energy flows and intermediate heat output and all sorts of things that require a lot of book reading-OW!" Zackel said as Rielle slapped him across the back of his head.

"There's a difference between saying I won't understand and puffing your chest that you do. Get on with it. Zack." Rielle said.

"Fine, fine." Zackel said, rubbing the sore spot. She had one heck of an arm: he'd hated to see what would happen if she outright punched him. "Basically anyone who isn't us walks through, I'll know. And as an added bonus effect…_kaled."_

Rielle felt the temperature drop abruptly, even as the runes glowed and ice manifested near-immediately, over a dozen stabbing blades of frost erupting and filling the doorway.

"I suppose if you were running, you'd have a decent shot at dodging. Otherwise…well, again, might not be fatal. But I doubt anything that will be caught in that will be happy." Zackel said, turning to Rielle. "Now, you just made me waste one of my hard-made traps. I'll need something from my bags to fix it, why don't you…"

This time, Rielle flicked Zackel on the forehead. Even that was painful.

"YEOW!"

"It will be quicker if you go get it, don't you think?" Rielle said with a wry grin.

"…mayhaps." Zackel grumbled, heading off. "Mayhaps."

* * *

Journal Entry No # 431

_Girl has no sense of humor. Or mine is poorer than I recall. Not hard to make average Azeroth adventurer amused: just mock Horde or make unpleasant noises that sound gastrological in origin. Noted fact is that copious amount of alcohol is often involved. Not always mix well. Troll in Shattarth once try typical humor, alcohol kept him from realizing he was playing to an audience of dwarves. Not end well. _

_Did leave me alone afterward, let me poke through all the old, rotting tomes. Not find anything useful, besides time wasters. Want to say criminal what ogres did to books. Stop myself by remembering I'm talking about ogres. Ogres not as dumb as many think, but chances are higher that if you say you made chili, ogres will leave to get a blanket._

_V. Ashamed that I just drew from that body of humor. Good thing no one reads my journal except me.

* * *

_

"So. Rielle." Zackel said, hunched over a small wooden bowl he'd found in one of the fortress' rooms. His Draenei companion was lying on her bedding, staring at the ceiling.

"What."

"Do you have a last name?"

The snort the Draenei made indicated that Zackel had made a boo-boo again. No physical blows were forthcoming this time though: instead Rielle rolled onto her side, leaning on her hand as she looked at Zackel with annoyance.

"I never understood your human preoccupation with names. You need two names to define yourself. My species makes do with one. My name Rielle encapsulates both my individuality and my…family line." Rielle said. Zackel arched an eyebrow, wondering if the slight pause meant anything. "If we need something more, we grant titles. Titles are purely ceremonial in the end: they can be discarded without a second thought. Humans, on the other hand, take your two names so seriously. Fel, not just TWO. You have a first name, a family name, and then sometime in your life you grant yourself ANOTHER name, to further define yourself."

"You gain amusement from this?"

"There are some jokes I could tell you. Draenei humor."

"Right. A few counter-points." Zackel said. "One, it's not just humans that do that. Most of Azeroth does. Two, we have a very good reason for taking a secondary name over our family name. Names have power, especially in the wrong hands. With the Burning Legion forever at our horizon, not all of us can rely on an eons-long relationship with the Naaru to protect us from fel curses and blights that involve names."

"…You know your history."

"I know my gasconades." Zackel reply. "Your kind have spread fairly far in Azeroth during your time here. And while you have a general reputation, or maybe more accurately a concept, of being holy, benighted beings to a man, or to an alien if you will, plenty of you are down to earth. In all aspects. Some of you like your alcohol and your bragging as much as any human being."

"…you're not lying." Rielle said, turning her head to look at the fire.

"Not all of us are King Wrynn, either. With a battalion of mages and priests to keep name-curses away from him." Zackel said. "Forgive me for not being fully informed on how your species does nomenclature, but don't think I called myself Wintersoul just because of my talents."

"Talents?" Rielle said, a touch of gentle mockery in her voice as she looked at Zackel again.

"Oh ha ha ha. I certainly move snow well, don't I?" Zackel half-snapped half-groused.

"I suppose your brain is compensating for its inability to plan."

"I'm going to ignore you now." Zackel said, looking back at his alchemical work.

"What are you doing?" Rielle asked, back to looking at the ceiling.

"Something brilliant." Zackel replied, his words slipping out before he could stop himself.

"Well I suppose there's a first time for everything."

Zackel shot a glare as icy as his 'skill namesake' at the Draenei. If Rielle noticed, she gave no indication.

* * *

Journal Entry No # 432

_Sharp tongue on that girl. Undecided if her weapon or words are more cutting. Not surprising. Probably developed as part of general take-no-crap personality she demonstrates._

_Not mean though. Not in the true sense. Whether that's part of her peace overtures or her real personality, I don't know. It's been several days since we were stuck in here and I'm still trying to get her down._

_Will figure out if she tears down doing that, hopefully. Knowing the true origin of insults can make all the difference._

_Read last line. Not sure if it made sense. Too tired to change it. My journal anyway.

* * *

_

"NOW what are you doing?" Rielle said, looking down into the storage room from the floor above. It was an odd design she'd noticed in a few human fortresses: their stairways terminated into a balcony over an open room that was often used for storage. She'd never been curious enough to ask why. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that most of the Eastern Kingdom's architects had somehow ended up as a giant criminal gang.

"I need something. And there's an old door back here I didn't notice before. Might have it." Zackel said, before cursing and stepping back from said door. "And my attempt to deal with it's rusted lock and warped frame get nowhere. Rielle, give me your axe."

"WHAT?"

"Your axe. I'm going to use it to pry the door open."

"ARE YOU CRAZY? Use your damn staff!"

"This staff is treated wood and an empowered gem. It's not meant to be used as an improvised crowbar." Zackel said. "I saw you throw your axe into a stone wall. The wall gave, the axe didn't. I doubt anything I can do will damage it. Come on now. I'll polish your armor or something."

"I don't want you anywhere near my armor. You'll probably turn it green or something."

"Does that mean I can't have the axe?"

"Fine. Break it, I break you." Rielle said, leaning over the edge of the balcony and dropping her axe down. Zackel watched it fall on the floor.

"WHAT THE FEL ARE YOU DOING?! YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO CATCH IT!"

"Catch the heavy, sharp weapon, or let its hardened body hit the floor and pick it up without risking it or myself. I wonder which was the wiser choice." Zackel said.

"I am going to go down there and open the door by using your hard head."

"You'd better hurry." Zackel said, lifting the axe with considerable effort. He noted that Rielle did not actually go down to confront or hurt him, instead watching from her position on the floor above as Zackel dragged the axe over to the door. Opening the door with it proved to be relatively simple. The axe's incredible weight and Zackel's less than optimal strength made it hard.

"Good light." Zackel said, staggering back and falling on his rear after he was done, the axe clattering down on the ground. "What the hell do they make these things out of, supercompressed mountains?"

"No, you're just weak." Rielle said. "As amusing as watching you fail is, give me my axe back."

"I'll be up the stairs in a bit."

"Stairs nothing. Hand it back up here."

Zackel looked up the Draenei, who flashed a wicked grin.

"So, did you drive all your slaves mad, or just work them to death?" Zackel said, getting up. He steeled himself, and then lifted the axe up hilt-first, trying to get it within range of the Draenei's hand.

"Stop complaining. I have to risk my neck because you don't have any muscle." Rielle replied, leaning far over the old wooden balcony. Her fingers brushed the end of the shaft several times: Zackel had no idea if she actually couldn't grasp it or was just drawing out his pain.

Once she had a firm grip, Rielle easily lifted the weapon one handed, and even took her other hand off the balcony to salute Zackel. Zackel just stared with dull annoyance.

"Now, next time Zack…" Rielle said, twisting around to put her axe on the ground next to her. "You won't enlist my…"

The loud crack sounded through the stairway, and Rielle's eyes widened. She hadn't stopped leaning on the old wooden balcony when she'd been putting her weapon down, and the worn-out construct was finally giving up the ghost.

"Oh." Rielle said.

The balcony gave way, and Rielle clawed at the air as she fell, trying to find something to grab onto and finding air a very poor substance to try and get a handhold on.

At least she wasn't wearing her armor. That worked out well for her and Zackel, as she landed on him.

"…oops." Rielle said, lying on top of the wizard. She hadn't _felt _any bones break, hers or Zackel's. "You all right?"

"Nice landing. I'm probably paralyzed."

"Everything but your mouth, it seems."

* * *

Journal Entry No # 433

_Hate my life._

_Found what I was looking for at least._

_Still hate my life.

* * *

_

There was more to training then practicing weapon-katas, and Rielle made a point every day to run around the fortress, her axe over her shoulders. It was doing that that she had discovered Zackel trying to get into the door her axe had provided entry to. It was returning from that that she discovered why he'd wanted to get in.

"What are you doing?" Rielle said, watching Zackel string a rope across the room in front of the fireplace.

"Trying to improve my accommodations, temporary as they are." Zackel said. Rielle noticed there was another new item in the room: a large wooden vat. It seemed to have once been used to clean livestock. Now it was filled with some sort of bubbling liquid, which was soaking some unidentified material. Glancing around the room, Rielle noticed the ogre furs Zackel had been sleeping in were missing.

"…ah. Soap." Rielle said.

"Got it in one." Zackel said, yanking on the hook he'd gotten from somewhere, driven into the wall with a makeshift rock hammer, and tied the rope to. "Took me a few days to work out the formula with what I had available. But, provided I did it right…we will soon have clean, fresh thick furs."

"And you did this instead of, say, finding a way to insulate the room?" Rielle said.

"Sleeping in a pile of stinking pelts tends to focus one's priorities. That's next on the itinerary. I think I have a glue I can modify slightly to do that." Zackel said, heading over to the cleaning-vat and stirring the furs in it with an old broken staff. "Once that's done, we'll be as comfortable as any inn in Ironforge."

"With a notable lack of drunk dwarves."

"Dwarves don't get drunk. They just enjoy their alcohol more and more." Zackel said, kneeling by the cleaning-vat. "Okay…need more snow, melt as water, rinse…dry. Hardest part is switching out the soap…but then…"

"Zack?"

"Yes?" Zackel said, making the irritation at her insistence of calling him that clear in his voice.

"What do you mean WE will have fresh furs?"

* * *

Journal Entry No # 434

_Girl stole my furs. Again._

_Soap worked. Furs clean. Smell fine. So of course she wants them now. Too tired to complain._

_V. Certain I can't get any more irritated at this failed plan._

_Don't want to be proved wrong. Want to sleep. At least have sleep of just. Even if it just on old, thinner furs.

* * *

_

It was not the old-new furs that woke Zackel up a few hours later. It was the need to use the washroom. Zackel made his way to the old fortress' privy, which Zackel and Rielle stayed in as little as possible for VERY obvious reasons. At least she hadn't forced him to clean THAT yet. Though once their main room was insulated, Zackel was strongly considering doing it anyway.

When he returned, Rielle was sitting by the fire. She had actually been doing that when he'd gotten up: he had just not noticed.

"Zackel."

"…yes?" Zackel said, not sure if she was acknowledging him or trying to get his attention.

"Sit down." Rielle said, patting the furs next to her. She'd dragged her bedding closer to the fire, and was sipping another of Zackel's 'acquired' drinks.

"Something wrong?" Zackel said, hesitating.

"Sit down wizard. I don't bite." Rielle said. Zackel did as he was 'told'.

"You did a good job on these furs." Rielle said.

"You're welcome."

"I put you down, but you are pretty clever."

"…thank you?"

"Been sitting and thinking." Rielle said. "Haven't treated you that nicely."

"I noticed."

"I think you should know why. Well…at least why I'm here. Why I showed up to help you."

"…all right." Zackel said, making himself comfortable. It seemed like the Draenei was going to stop being so tight-lipped about herself. "I'm listening."

"You mages are a bunch of bastards."

"Well it's not exactly once upon a time but it catches the ear."

"Ha ha." Rielle said. "Trust me Zackel. When I'm done, you will see I have a very, VERY good reason for holding that opinion."


	6. Why We Fight: Cold Front

Chapter 6: Cold Front

There was something wrong about Northrend.

Any dwarf or gnome with a certain mental bent could ramble on for hours about the nature of the cold (considering where they lived, it was understandable they were experts). They could talk about how the sun (or the lack thereof) affected things, how winds could form and drive temperatures down, how the position of mountains and bodies of water could change details, and some of the smartest and/or most unhinged ones could ramble about how everything was made of tiny little objects all linked together whose movement created heat, and certain factors slowed the movement and created less heat and therefore cold, though not many people listened to such insane nonsense. Once, Northrend had been bound by those certainties.

The great darkness that had fallen over it the past several decades had changed all that. Any dwarf visiting the frozen wastes for the first time always felt a bit off-put, like there was something scratching at the back of their minds they couldn't put their finger on. Those that survived and stayed eventually realized it.

Northrend was not cold because, due to natural factors, it lacked heat. Northrend was cold because it seemed to devour heat. Like the plague of undeath that sought to consume all life, Northrend had seemingly been blighted into a twisted symbiosis to the creatures that ruled it, leeching temperature and warmth away like the land itself craved it. To the hardened adventurers that had stepped on its shores, there was nothing quite like it. There were other dangerous lands on Azeroth, like the shifting baking sands of Silithus, the toxic aberrations of the Plaguelands, and the fiery pits and chaotic planes that lay beyond the Dark Portal in Outland. And yet those who had traversed and survived all those perilous locations could feel it. Northrend was a bad land. Death ruled, and thrived there.

The continent had taken its fair share of souls. But for those who dared to stay, it could lift them to peaks few reached. And for all its endless ice and snow, there was life there. Life, and resources.

Those that fought over Lake Wintergrasp called it the Forest of Shadows. The wraith creatures that lurked there dropped unique crystals that served numerous purposes, and wood was always needed to fuel the efforts of war.

The troll death knight that quietly stalked through the darkened forest had an unclear goal. He could have been scouting, seeking a rare item, or just going for a walk. The motivation of the other side mattered little to the Alliance and Horde. Not since the Wrathgate. Not since the long-smoldering embers of a dark, terrible past had erupted back into open fire.

The bitter irony was, had history taken a different turn, the dwarf rogue that was sneaking up on the troll might have been accompanying him instead. It was true that dwarves and members of the Horde were hardly friends, but Northrend was commanded by a greater enemy that could force such divisions aside, at least for a time. Until the Wrathgate. And so things returned to how they had been.

It seemed that luck that time favored the death knight, as it turned and fired off a blast of green power. The dwarf rogue was caught completely off guard, certain it had not given the slightest trace of its presence, and was hurled into a tree. No sooner had the dwarf impacted then another blast of dark power erupted from the death knight's hand, seizing the rogue and pulling him through the air. The dwarf was probably not happy about getting smashed into the second tree, but it was likely a better option then the nastily-barbed bladed staff the troll had unsheathed.

"_Deme pokurr."_ The troll chuckled, the eerie echo a death knight acquired in his creation unable to obliterate the unique accent all trolls spoke him. The rogue struggled to get up and slip away: fighting a death knight head on was a losing proposition for most. The troll knew it as well, as he stalked towards the rogue.

The knife glanced off the troll's blackened red armor. It succeeded in getting his attention regardless.

"Hey. Pigeon." Rielle said, a dozen feet away with axe in hand. "Forget the small fry. Real meat's over here."

The troll chuckled again, saying something in its native tongue Rielle didn't understand.

The trick came when the death knight stopped in mid-sentence and fired off the same black energy that had ensnared the dwarf.

This time, all it hit was snow. Rielle had dodged at the last second, going low and charging towards the Horde member.

* * *

"_Wait wait. You ran towards it?"_

"_What did you expect me to do? Stand there and let it drag me over?"_

"_Well no but…well, I've heard of the abilities death knights have…"_

"_So you're one of THOSE people." Rielle growled._

"_What people?"_

"_Ever since the Ebon Blade turned on the Lich King and sided with us, all anyone ever talks about half the time is how powerful and terrible death knights are. You didn't hear anything about their overwhelming greatness when they were __**all **__fighting us, but the second that group switched sides, it went through both camps like wildfire. People didn't want to do anything without a death knight or two by their side."_

"_They haven't exactly had it easy."_

"_Neither have WE." Rielle said. "My people suffered as well. And as you yourself said, we have the reputation of being pure and blessed. That seems to be better than something dragged back from death in a defiance of the natural laws of life and empowered with corrupting dark energies, but you don't, and you didn't, see everyone writing sonnets about how magnificent WE were."_

"I think the Blood Elves covered that patch of egotism quite well."

"_Don't remind me." Rielle said. "I'm not saying I'm ungrateful for their aid. Nor am I dismissing their torment. I just wish people would stop thinking that death knights will turn the tide in everything."_

"_New things tend to attract a lot of attention." Zackel said, sipping some conjured water. "I'm certain in the future the death knights will become just another aspect of the great struggle in Azeroth."_

"_Can't happen too soon." Rielle said. "Where was I? Oh yes, I ran towards it, because unlike what some people assume, I know what I'm doing…"

* * *

_

Death Knights did have many powerful abilities. They could boil an enemy's blood, or lay down a circle of searing poison around them. They could shackle an enemy with chains of ice, or raise corpses to serve as unthinking weapons. But if death knights had a weakness, it was that all such tactics required a few seconds to charge up and unleash.

Rielle knew that weakness very well. It was partly why she was still alive. And so she charged, and before the troll death knight could swing things in his favor, she was swinging her axe at his face.

The death knight was not so slow as to be defenseless though, and blocked Rielle's weapon with his own. Rielle spun off the deflect, her axe swinging low to slice at the enemy's legs. The troll leapt over the attack, and followed by ramming his shoulder into Rielle's form, knocking her to the ground.

"_Ta'kaarr!_" The troll declared, unholy energy ignited on his hand. Rielle met the hand with her boot, kicking the troll and knocking said hand up. The deflected blast set a nearby tree's branches on fire, even as Rielle pulled her leg back and thrust it into the troll's chest, sending him staggering backwards. No sooner had he recovered than Rielle had as well, getting right in his face and bringing her axe down. Sparks shot off the weapon as they clashed, again and again.

Death knights had another weakness, something they shared with Forsaken. Their risen bodies didn't (usually) handle sudden, intense stress well. It had something to do with the blood flow having ceased, and the dark energies that had replaced the body-animating/fueling process sometimes getting a little confused on where they were supposed to go. It was possible to be overcome, but it required training and experience, and it was clear to Rielle she had the edge in those two things here. The troll's blows were slowing down, just a bit. In seconds, she'd have an opening. One opening was all she needed. As long as she kept the death knight from tapping into his rune abilities, as long as she kept up the pressure…

As long as someone didn't throw a massive stream of destructive energies at them.

Rielle didn't hear the cast: she was too caught up in the fight. Her only warning was the faint twinge of motion in the corner of her eye, and that was too fast for even her to react to. The good news was, all Alliance spell casters attuned their spells to keep their companions from being harmed by friendly fire.

That was little consolation to Rielle as the blast exploded against the troll, tearing her out of her mortal duel with a curse. The troll cursed more, having been hurled a dozen feet away.

"_FINNATE!"_ Came the yell, and another eruption of arcane energies slammed into the troll. It came to a rest several further feet away, and from its posture as it started getting up it was clear it had decided discretion was the better point of valor.

"No, damn it." Rielle cursed, as the troll began retreating. A fireball tried to cut the retreat off, but all said fireball encountered was a tree, the death knight slipping around it. Rielle whirled to the source of the attack.

She recognized that voice.

"SPARSE!" Rielle snapping, looking at the red and purple-roped figure, blazing green staff in his hand. Sparse Blazebolt was in his late 30's, possessing a very tall but also rather thin figure his robes helped cover somewhat. His intense eyes were somewhat undermined by a weak chin and stringy hair: Sparse had tried to cover this fact by growing a 'beard'. Since his hair was so thin, what might have been a nice Vandyke on a normal man looked like a glued on piece of collected horsehair on Sparse. Whether Sparse persisted in the attempted look out of obliviousness or stubbornness, who could say.

"No no, Draenei." Sparse said, spinning his staff once. "My name has two syllables. SPAR-REZE. SPAR-REZE. It's not complicated."

"I don't care if your name is pronounced Raymond Luxury-Yacht! What the fel are you doing?!"

"Aiding my companions. You're welcome by the way." Sparse said. Rielle stared, and then quickly jogged over to the fallen dwarf rogue, who had been resting against the second tree he'd been tossed into.

"How are you Sognus?"

"Oi. That's not an experience I'd be likin' to repeat." Sognus Fireclench said, blood dripping down his forehead and staining his blonde beard.

"That makes two of us." Rielle said, looking back at Sparse.

"See? I helped."

"…all right Sparse. Yes, you helped." Rielle said, standing up and helping Sognus as she did so. "You helped make a great big racket in a situation you poorly assessed, and as a result probably told every single Horde in a mile radius that hey, TROUBLE IS HERE."

"You were fighting for your life!"

"Yes. And you could have been quieter."

"I don't see why…"

The arrow embedded itself in the tree next to the mage. Rielle would have enjoyed the way his eyes bugged out more if two more arrows hadn't promptly impaled themselves in the tree she and Sognus was standing next to.

"And now we have to _run."_ Rielle growled, and grabbed up Sognus and took off as the two Horde hunters, an Orc and a Blood Elf respectively, tried their best to turn them into pincushions.

As a small point of pride, Rielle noted that when she finally stopped running a mile later she was barely winded, while Sparse looked about ready to pass out. Sognus' complaints over being carried did little to take the edge off. She knew he was really thankful: he just couldn't show it in typical stubborn dwarf fashion.

"You did help, Sparse." Rielle said. "But as you can see, help is best if you don't have to end up expressing it audibly."

* * *

"…_did you really say that?"_

"…_okay no. I just called him an asshole." Rielle said. "Thought of the better chastisement later. Made me sound better, rather than a pissed off bitch."_

"…_Er…"_

"_I'm not done, __**Zack**__." Rielle said. "I'm just telling you why I'm here. I don't plan to go into __**all **__the crap Sparse caused me. Not just me either. He wasn't a load, and he was powerful, but he was also in love with his own power. Followed instructions if given, but if a situation came up where he had to think to himself, he did the first thing that popped into his head, Whenever someone called him on it, he'd just say he did what he thought was best. That's fine, except he KEPT DOING IT. He refused to listen to any advice. Worse, he'd try and turn it around and make the complainer look bad, and believe me, with all the difference personalities thrown together in that place, that matters more than you'd realize. It wasn't getting anyone killed, I'll admit…but when you're trying to form a united front, you need to learn how to fill in cracks. You don't let them grow just because you think they look pretty."_

"_Still…"_

"_Zack, if it was just little incidents like that, I wouldn't be here." Rielle said. "I would have learned to tolerate him. No, this is where things get good. And when I say good, I mean…"

* * *

_

"Stupid bastard." Rielle said, crouched around one of the several campfires in the secondary right courtyard of Wintergrasp Fortress. The draenei took one last bite from her rack of ribs, and tossed the mostly bare bones into the fire. "I HAD that death knight. I KNOW I did. I'm not bragging here, I could have actually made a hole in the Horde's forces instead of sending him off with a few burns and some wounded pride."

The several Alliance members around the fire glanced at the Draenei, and then at Sognus, who was also sitting around the fire.

"Don't look at me lads. She certainly did better then me, I'll give her that." Sognus said, drinking his ale. "But for all we know, those reinforcements were heading our way before Sparse showed up."

"…yeah, maybe." Rielle said.

"Do not waste your anger on small things, my child." Colthan said. One of her fellow Draenei, a paladin in his case, he had played peacemaker between more than a few camp disputes. "Good intentions should receive their due reward."

"Key word _due _there, Colthan." Rielle said. "I know that Sparse protected our healers during that big assault last week. And I know he and Niraband and our other mages are vital in getting word to Dalaran and the other fronts swiftly. But I didn't come here for the vapors. I came here to fight, and I'm here because I CAN fight. That's a problem I've noticed with mages in general."

"What?" Said another campfire members, this one a dwarf hunter. Rielle believed his first name was Golir: she couldn't recall his last name.

"Well, they need us. They break easily and we don't. If we're not there, the monster is stepping on THEM." Rielle said. "Oh yes, we need them too. They possess great power and can do many things we can't. But I find too often too many of them don't realize the give and take of it. We take the blows so they can give them out. They seem to think half the time they could easily get the job done whether we were there or not. They're too enthused about their power. Think it substitutes for tactical thinking, and humility. Which isn't a good thing, you know."

"Aye." Golir and Sognus said at nearly the same time.

"It is true humans and the like tend to lose focus about the big picture." Colthan said, rubbing his face tendrils. "Mystical energies do possess great challenges to wield though. There are bound to be errors. We must show patience with these errors, and where we can, smooth them out."

"Hey, I'm perfectly happy to help." Rielle said. Several camp members burst out laughing. "Very funny. You know what I mean. Not the crux of the problem Colthan. The crux is they don't think they need help. And when they do what they do, they think it's all THEIR doing. It wears on my nerves. And I doubt I'm alone."

"You are not." Colthan said, standing up. "I shall try and be more observant of these points you have raised, Rielle. It may prove more exigent than I realize."

"Whatever." Rielle said, though her tone was friendly, and she held out her fist for Colthan to touch as he walked by.

"…hey Rielle can I ask you a question?" A gnome rogue said, blurting his words out in a rush. Rielle wasn't certain when he'd gotten there: she'd been caught up in her conversation.

"Yes….what was your name again?"

"Carullyn Slipwound, draenei lady!" The gnome said. "I have a bet! Are you with Colthan or Bladesong?"

"…wait, WHAT?"

"We have a small disagreement that we've decided to settle whether you're sharing tents with…"

That was all Carullyn got out as Rielle swiped her axe at the gnome. He yelped and ran for it, Rielle chasing him around the courtyard a bit before she lost him. She stalked back over to the campfire, muttering about rogue trickery, and sat back down.

"And there will be no more questions in THAT vein."

* * *

"_Stupid question anyway."_

"_What?"_

"_Well Colthan was a Draenei, and Bladesong clearly sounds like a human, ergo even money would be…"_

"_That I'd be with Colthan?" Rielle said._

"_Well, seems like…"_

_The forehead flick was no less painful the second time._

"_OW!"_

"_Maybe if I do this enough, you'll stop making assumptions." Rielle said._

"_Okay, sorry for assuming you were with Colthan."_

"_That's not it. I wasn't, though. He was noble and strong, but paladins tend to be long-term types first and foremost. Not really my thing." Rielle said. "The assumption was Colthan was a sure thing because he's one of my kind. I've been with human men you know."_

"…_really?"_

"_Yes."_

"…_does that even work?"_

_This time, Rielle didn't bother with a flick: she slapped Zackel lightly upside the head._

"_Ow…I really have to stop talking." Zackel groaned._

"_It might help."_

"_It's still a valid question."_

"_What, you've never seen mix and match relationships? You are deprived."_

"_Well no, I've seen night elves and dwarves and all that with humans, but…"_

"_We're a different species? Is that really any different from those long willowy reeds I've seen so many human men lust after?" Rielle said. Zackel assumed she was talking about night elves. "The Titans crafted us all from the same clay. We're more alike then many realize."_

"…_can I say something with the promise you won't hit me?"_

"_Perhaps."_

"_Okay maybe we're not so different…but still. There ARE differences. For all we know, cross-species intercourse could feel like sodomy to one or both species. That's even assuming the same parts do the OKAY I'M DONE DONE!" Zackel said, cowering back at Rielle raised her hand again. "I think it's a valid hypothesis."_

"_So noted." Rielle said. "For your conclusion, it works just fine. Well, the few men I've 'tested' it with had no complaints."_

"_Somehow I think we've gotten off track."_

"_We have. Just letting you know WHY I reacted the way I did…"

* * *

_

"You know lass, it was probably just a dare to come over here and needle you. You are a known hothead." Sognus said.

"I can live with that reputation. And I won't tolerate such questions regardless." Rielle said. "So, has anyone heard any new word on what's going on around Northrend?"

"I haven't heard anything…" One of the human warriors who had been quiet began saying.

Rielle stopped paying attention as she saw the second gnome approach. She actually knew this one, and she snatched up her axe again.

"Tell your friends, Callowwax, that I will have no problem punting them when they sleep."

"What?" Sunry Callowwax said. A gnome warlock, he had ridiculous-looking purple hair he somehow kept intact in the less-then-kind atmosphere of Northrend.

"You're NOT here inquiring about my sleeping arrangements?"

"Why would I care about that?" Sunry said. "I came here to tell you something. You have a run-in with Sparse today Rielle?"

"…yessssss?" Rielle said, suddenly very curious.

"Because I was just walking by Commander Zanneth's tent. He was in there complaining about someone. I'm pretty sure I heard your…"

Rielle almost knocked Sunry over when she dashed past him.

"One day your spying is going to get you in trouble Callowwax." Another of the humans, a priest, commented as the gnome regained his balance.

"Who's spying? I can't help it if I keep coming into interesting information…"

* * *

Captain Zanneth, a man who looked younger than his experiences (which were considerable, which is why he was in charge of the Alliance forces trying to consolidate Wintergrasp. Well that, and his metabolism was so insanely high that the intense cold barely bothered him, to the point where he rode around without a shirt, something that either mightily impressed his conscripts or made them think he was insane), heard Rielle coming. Whether he heard her in time to warn Sparse but didn't, or was simply alerted too late, who could say.

"In the manners of…" Sparse was saying, when the firm hand seized him and whirled him around.

"You got something to say, asshole? THEN SAY IT TO MY FACE." Rielle snarled, dragging Sparse around a moment before she found a tent pole to slam him into.

"UNHAND ME YOU CRAZY BITCH!" Sparse yelled, pulling his hand up as it glowed purple.

"Try it. Just. TRY." Rielle whispered.

"ENOUGH!" Zanneth yelled, slamming his sword down on the table that served as the primary strategizing aspect of Wintergrasp, though at the moment it just had a large map and a few papers on it. "Sparse, you tuck that power back into wherever you drew it from, and you…Rielle I assume? You put him down."

Rielle glared at her erstwhile commander: the fact he held her gaze and matched it made her listen, and she let Sparse go before stepping back. The wizard smoothed out his robe with exaggerated annoyance, and for a brief moment, Rielle fought against a powerful urge to punch him in the face.

"Now, about you charging in here like a felhound out of Outland…"

"I don't appreciate being lied about, sir." Rielle said, glaring at Sparse.

"And how do you know that's even the case, soldier?" Zanneth said, both hands planted firmly on the table.

"Does that really matter?"

"Considering you were the one who initiated violence at a drop of a hat, it doesn't exactly look good for you."

"…fine." Rielle said, crossing her arms, her axe shifting on her back. "What did he say?"

"Blazebolt was recounting the incident this afternoon, about how you engaged the death knight when the rogue could have taken care of it…"

"I ENGAGED that death knight because he heard Sognus coming! I don't know HOW, but he did! I saved Sognus' LIFE, possibly!"

"Yes, how did the death knight realize Sognus was coming?" Sparse said, stroking his chin. "You might have tipped the troll off that there was another presence there. You aren't exactly good at hiding…"

"Oh you are good." Rielle hissed. "I didn't give one indication I was there until Sognus got in trouble. I certainly didn't want to fight so bad that I blew my cover, even in a small, crucial way! Don't you see what Sparse is trying to pull with this crap, commander? He's mad that I yelled at him for being the REAL one who tipped off Horde that we were there!"

"He did mention that, yes. And apologized." Zanneth said. "Not being there, I cannot say exactly how it went down."

"Why don't you call Sognus? Better yet, why don't you call the other people Sparse has tried this little trick on? Because I'm not the first. Just the first where he decided he'd try and really screw someone over."

"He was not screwing you over in any sense, Rielle." Zanneth said, his tone cross. "When he was done, I was going to summon you and get your account of events. Except you came barging in first, because it's clear someone doesn't know when to give people privacy."

"I don't care…"

"LEARN!" Zanneth yelled, slamming his fist into the table. "We have ENOUGH problems, Rielle! The Horde isn't letting us have any peace, and don't forget that stone giant in the mine we have to pacify every now and then! It took over two dozen of us to do it the last time! If you can't address your problems without wasting my time, then I can offer you some STRONG reasons to do so. Otherwise, stay out of each other's way. That goes for you too, Sparse."

"Um sir, it's two syllables. SPA…"

"I DON'T CARE IF IT'S PRONOUCED THROATWOBBLER MANGROVE! Get out of my tent!" Zanneth said, pointing.

"Sir…" Rielle said.

"NOW!"

* * *

Sparse's attempt to slip away once he left the tent failed, as Rielle quickly got around in front of him.

"Oh you _**ARE **_good." Rielle said. "Tell me, did you improvise when you realized there was a spy? Or did you know he'd be there to begin with? Fel, maybe you paid him off."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"You're sitting pretty here, aren't we, SPARSE." Rielle said, purposely pronouncing his name wrong. "If I don't come along, you get to badmouth me. If I do come along, oh look, the hotheaded Draenei is overdoing it and yelling at the captain, surely I come off as more reasonable in my presentation. Or at least, the captain gets madder at the one who charged in and made a big racket, adding to his overall headache." Rielle said, spitting her words through gritted teeth. Her revelation didn't help her at all: by the time she'd had it (that being now) the damage was done.

"Do we have to do this draenei? You heard Commander Zanneth. There are more important things to be concerned about."

"What do you think I'm dealing with, wizard?" Rielle replied. "You're right, we don't have to like each other. We just have to work together. Normally I'd do just that, even IF you decided to pull this passive-aggressive smear job instead of confronting me right up. But you seem to think I haven't been paying attention to all the little nuggets of crap you've been dropping all over the place. I can see exactly what you're going to do. You won't stop with your little poison asides and pointed gossip. You'll keep talking to everyone you can, doing your best to undermine me, and whoever else isn't going to put up with your bullshit. You're SCUM, wizard. I might yell at some of my companions here, chase them around, but I'd never pull anything like what YOU'RE doing. You're quite willing to shoot holes through our entire effort just to salve your wounded ego. No, Sparse. Not on my watch."

"Your watch?" Sparse said, sliding his hand slightly up his staff. "And what precisely does that constitute? Last I checked, you had no authority over me."

"I'm not going to appeal to your better nature, because apparently you got rid of that at some point. But I know what you do like." Rielle said. "You like winning. Challenging you to a proper duel would screw our effort over though, so I'll improvise. I'll play that card game you and your wizard friends like so much. Multitudes, I believe it's called."

"Really?" Sparse said, and Rielle could swear she saw his thin chest puffing up. "Do you know how to play?"

"I know that the kind of game you like is called One-Shot. Anything else would be tipping my hand." Rielle said. "You just got paid, didn't you? We'll throw in both our purses. And before you say that's boring, I'm not done. You win, I'll stop harassing you. I'll do you one better. I'll give you an indentured clause in my Wintergrasp contract."

"…really?"

"Yeah." Rielle said. "But only if you match such an offer. I have a suggestion. You lose, you stop talking. You get caught talking, you forfeit wages and any share of any treasure or resources we find. What say you, Sparse?" Rielle said, actually pronouncing his name right this time. "You have anything resembling a set of testicles under that robe?"

"You should just be glad that your-soon-to-be master is explicitly forbidden doing anything with them." Sparse said. For a moment, Rielle almost forgot about doing anything reasonable and considered lopping Sparse's head off with her axe right then and there. "I'll meet you in an hour, draenei. The usual spot. Enjoy it. You likely won't have many enjoyable hours in the near-immediate future."

Rielle didn't say anything as she stalked away.

* * *

"_Wait, indentured clause? Does that mean…?"_

"_Servitude." Rielle said. "I'd have to do just about anything he said, while we both operated under an Alliance banner towards Alliance matters. Carry things, clean his clothes, rub his feet, take his notes, anything…"_

"_You lost?"

* * *

_

Never let the enemy see you sweat, or bleed. That was part of the advice Rielle took to heart. It was why she had made such a strong, dangerous bet, against a very strong, dangerous opponent. Because Rielle knew Sparse was very good at Multitudes. She knew how the game was played, and that was that.

"I really don't know if this is a good idea Rielle." Colthan said. Rielle didn't look at her fellow Draenei: she kept her eyes ahead as she walked towards the 'duel site'. Word had quickly crossed the whole camp, and a fair crowd had gathered.

"You're not the one going through with it Colthan." Rielle said.

"Considering your dislike of him, I do not like the possibilities of what could occur if…"

"I don't either, Colthan." Rielle said, this time looking at her fellow, her glowing eyes smoldering with determination. "But what's better? Letting him whisper his nasty little lies into every willing ear he can find, until people aren't seeing me, but his version of me? Or getting a chance to put him in his place? If I lose, I'll lose knowing I made a decision believing it was the right thing to do. Quite frankly, if a Broken can turn out to be a herald of a brand new way to fight the Legion, I'm quite willing to accept that anything can happen." Rielle said. Colthan did not reply.

Sparse was already sitting at the table when Rielle arrived. His 'friends' backed him up, though they dispersed into the crowd after he indicated that was what he wanted. The crowd behind Rielle also moved away, a show of respect to indicate neither side had someone else looking at their cards.

"Would the lady like to shuffle?" Sparse said.

"Just deal, Sparse." Rielle said, tossing her money sack into the small basket used to hold bets, as she counted the wooden circles that Sparse and his friends used for playing pieces. Finding them all in place, she picked up the cards Sparse dealt her.

"Pardon me." Colthan said, sitting down between the pair. "Upon a moment's reflection, I have decided a neutral party would be useful here. I shall act as dealer of the cards."

"What? Are you kidding?" Sparse said. "You're gonna try and…"

"I swear on my honor, as a paladin, as a guest on your home, and on the principles of Uther the Lightbringer, that I will provide no advantage to EITHER side, on penalty of dishonor, death, and worse." Colthan said. There was little that carried more weight than a thrice-sworn vow of a paladin, and it was enough to quiet even Sparse.

"If I recall correctly, I deal cards once to either side that requests for them, between wagers. Once the second wager is concluded, the cards are laid down, and we repeat."

"Might as well start strong." Rielle said, and shoved a third of her chips to the center of the table. "I don't need any cards."

"I'll take two." Sparse said. He proved to make the better decision. He won.

* * *

"_I really don't want to know if I want to hear the rest of this." Zackel murmured into his hand._

"_Why? Don't you want to see the proud draenei get laid low by her assumption?" Rielle said. Her tone was oblique enough that Zackel couldn't tell if she was being serious or subtly sarcastic._

"_In all honesty? No." Zackel said. Rielle cocked her head, her glowing eyes as ambiguous as her voice._

"_Well, unless you get up and go back to bed, I'm continuing."

* * *

_

The mood in the crowd had dampened considerably in the twenty minutes since the game had started. Many had gathered for the same reason Rielle had made her challenge. That fact had soured, as by now most of Rielle's chips were now on Sparse's side of the table: the Draenei was losing at a rate of four hands to one. Colthan had tried his best to keep on a non-partisan front, but part of him wanted to step in and stop the game. Rielle was out of her league, and everyone knew it. On top of that, she did not have that good a game face to start with, and it had steadily deteriorated despite her best efforts, causing Sparse to pick up even more wins.

"Would you like to call it even and just settle for losing the purse?" Sparse asked.

"Screw you. One card please." Rielle said. It didn't help her, as she lost once more.

"Well, I'm tired of sitting around." Sparse said, taking the chips he had just won before pushing them and more back into the center. Rielle's eyes flickered down, doing a swift count. The only way she could match it was if she bet all her remaining chips.

"You know what? So am I." Rielle said, shoving what she had left to join Sparse's.

"Very good then. I'll take three cards." Sparse said. Colthan dealt them, taking Sparse's discarded cards in turn. Rielle barely noticed, as she stared at her hand. She did that for nearly a minute.

"Two cards." She finally said.

Colthan offered them. Rielle reached out.

And slashed her hand past Colthan's, seizing Sparse's sleeve and yanking it up. The wizard recoiled backwards at the sudden movement. It was not fast enough to keep the several cards hidden there from flying out of his sleeve.

"….ah ha." Rielle said, now standing. "Just a _little_ too slow that time Sparse."

All the blood left Sparse's face as he realized how trapped he was. The shock of the crowd at this sudden action and what it had uncovered began to give way to angry murmurs.

"I was LOSING, ASSHOLE." Rielle said, throwing Sparse's arm down on the table in disgust. She had waited a long time for the precise-perfect moment to expose Sparse, and she was going to milk it. "You could have beat me fair, easy. But I knew. I KNOW your breed. I didn't have to win. All I had to do was make sure YOU didn't want to lose. And in that, I show why anything you claim isn't worth the air you use to express it."

"…you…you…" Sparse stammered.

"Eh eh. I'm not involved in this any more Sparse. You are. Time to man up." Rielle said, reaching over to the basket and withdrawing her money purse. "Fel, keep your money. It's probably as dirty as you."

"Now hold on people. Let's not forget the bigger picture here…" Colthan said, standing up to both protect Sparse and to keep him from running. Rielle strolled off, not paying much attention to the angry yells that Colthan was trying to quiet. Sparse had won a fair number of games, and with what Rielle had shown everyone, that fact was about to crash down on him with all the fury of the earth giant in the mine's fists.

When Rielle spoke as she headed back to her tent, it was to no one in particular.

"You should have listened to your own false flattery, Sparse. I'm no lady."

* * *

"…_you clever girl."_

"_Why thank you." Rielle said, doing a little fake primping._

"…_wait, one thing though." Zackel said. "What if he hadn't been cheating?"_

"_Then I would have lost, and I wouldn't be here. And you might be roasting over an ogre's cooking fire." Rielle said. "I went with my gut. I took how skilled he was, and how he acted, and made a calculated risk that he'd want the carrot so bad he'd try to get rid of the stick. I'm not wrong very often. Not when I don't want to be."_

"_You saw him hiding cards?"_

"_He was very good at it, that I will admit. Was pretty worried when I didn't see anything at all during the first half of the game." Rielle said. "But I've trained myself to catch arrows in mid-air. There's no small movement that doesn't escape my attention, sooner or later."_

"………_So wait, does that mean…"_

"_That I saw you tuck your little journal into your robes? Yes. I told you Zack. I'm very good at this." Rielle said, her eyes twinkling in mischievous joy at Zackel's stunned expression. "I figured if you were going to THAT much trouble to hide it, it really wasn't my business. That, or I read it when you were sleeping. Which is the truth? Will you ever know?"_

_Zackel was silent for a long while._

"…_the story's not done." Rielle said. "I thought Sparse would learn his lesson. Turns out it wasn't __**HIM **__I should have considered foremost."_


	7. Why We Fight: Pack Mentality

Chapter 7: Pack Mentality

"_Not Sparse?" Zackel said. "What, was there someone behind him, pulling some scheme you screwed up? Or…did you have a friend who was really more trouble, but Sparse's more irritating obviousness kept you from noticing him?"_

"_No. Good guesses though." Rielle said. "My 'error' was thinking I'd gotten the message clear across when I exposed his cheating. I did, to everyone who had sense. Do you know who didn't have sense?"_

"_Sparse?"_

"_Think a little bigger."_

"…_the mages in general."_

"_Like I said. Multitudes was THEIR game. You would think Sparse's disclosure as a cheat would have gotten him kicked out of their little clique. Wrong! Remember how I was talking about how mages had trouble grasping certain parts of reality, because of ego and whatnot? What I failed to account for was just how far they'd go to hold onto their comforting delusion." Rielle said. "I will tell the truth, Zackel. My species practices magic, and holds it in high esteem. But my experience with mages has been, had been, small before I'd joined the Wintergrasp efforts. And from what your fellows showed me…you're all a bunch of bastards."_

"_What did they do." Zackel said, a hand over his face again._

"_Well, since Sparse didn't bother me after that, I didn't see what was coming. I'm thinking Sparse convinced them I did what I did as some sort of plot to make them all look bad. Even down and out, he seemed to have a talent for presenting his case, pack of lies or no." Rielle said. "'Look at the warrior. She made everyone thing all us magic users are cheats and frauds. All the while she had one of her own dealing the cards. She deserves to be taught a lesson.' And so on."_

"_You're probably pretty close." Zackel said, hand still on his face. "What happened?"_

"_I thought I'd prevented problems from forming between our ranks." Rielle said. "Turns out that my efforts were a waste. These idiots didn't want solutions. They wanted to be right. No matter what they had to do to get it. A few weeks later, they got their chance."

* * *

_

The recently fallen snow crunched under Rielle's boots as she made her way towards her goal: the semi-volcanic crater dubbed the Cauldron of Flames. She didn't know her two companions well: they were both recent additions to the ranks at Wintergrasp. One, a Dwarf hunter called Fomfur Rockspark, was turning one of his gun bullets over and over in his fingers, his gorilla companion pet walking alongside him quietly and obediently. The other was a black mage, one Wirekoth Gleamember, who broke tradition with mages by wearing pants and a vest instead of a robe. He carried twin wands on his back: supposedly he had created a unique custom spell that let him fire off bolts of energy like one of the circular cannons dwarves were forever failing to get to work properly.

"Hold it." Fomfur said, stopping. His gorilla, who Rielle didn't know the name of, stopped to scoop up some snow and eat it. After a few seconds of doing so, the primate chuffed and began pacing around.

"Grasp's got a taste of something. Uncomfortable. Might be magical track covering." Fomfur said.

"Can't you tell?" Wirekoth asked.

"You're the wizard, lad. I thought maybe _you _could."

"Great." Rielle said, turning around. "Okay, look. We need to confirm whether there's been a resurgence of elementals in the Cauldron, and we need to do it without tipping off the Horde. Split up. Fomfur, go get our backup and tell them to also split up. Wirekoth, you'll go to the rendezvous point and meet up with me there. You encounter the Horde, you don't fight, you run. Don't want them to get any idea there might be something that we, and by extension they, can get from the area." Rielle said.

"Sure that's wise lass?" Fomfur said.

"A group is easier to spot than individuals. I packed invisibility potions just in case: they don't allow rogue levels of stealth, but they'll do." Rielle said, tossing one of said potions to Wirekoth before looking up and checking the sun. "We'll meet at the selected location in twenty-five minutes. Fomfur, you and the backup will meet at the fallback spot. If we're not there, proceed to the main rendezvous. If you run into Horde, retreat. We'll assume that you DID run into Horde if you're slow, so don't be."

"Got it." Wirekoth said, adjusting his glasses as he spoke.

"Okay then. Let's get a move on, they're not paying us by the hour." Rielle said, as the three separated and headed off their own ways.

* * *

"…_it had to have been planned." Rielle said, scratching at her ebony-silver hair. "It was too neat not to be. They just needed me to put myself in the right situation, and I did. I think Wirekoth may have been along with me just for that."_

"_He didn't head for where you were supposed to meet?"_

"_Oh no, I think he did one better." Rielle said. "That being going just close enough to step in when it was needed."_

"_Step in?"_

"_I got to the point on time. No one was there." Rielle said. "It was a good location for surveillance. Well hidden. I'm just letting you know that, so what's about to happen seems clearer."

* * *

_

Rielle cursed under her breath, glancing skyward at the sun once more. Wirekoth was seven minutes late. Maybe she shouldn't have trusted a rookie to know where he was going.

Or maybe he'd run into Horde, an event that would technically fall under being 'her fault'. Rielle raked a nearby rock with her fingers and thought over her options. As it had turned out, there was NOT an elemental resurgence happening in the Cauldron: indeed, there were no elementals at all. The mission was a wash, and she really should have just left. The fact that Wirekoth hadn't actually _done _anything to earn her impatience made her stay a bit longer.

The captain wasn't going to be pleased. The Horde had launched a massive campaign the previous week, and supplies were starting to run short. They needed more material for their vehicles, and that was one thing Dalaran could not easily provide. Maybe they'd have to reach even farther afield. Between that, and the whispers that had begun passing through the ranks of something vast and dark sleeping in the cracks of Northrend, another terror to add to the Lich King as problems faced by the adventurers who had come here, something called Yogg-Saron, it didn't seem like the…

The rock seemed to liquefy beneath Rielle's hand. The draenei barely had time to let out a noise of surprise before her whole cover gave way and she was suddenly sliding down the mountainside. The bouncing, rolling trip was anything but pleasant. Neither was the landing, as Rielle crashed down on the scorched black rock and dirt of the Cauldron, a snarling curse emitting from between her teeth.

Her second curse died on her lips as she looked up. Even as she did, she realized that she hadn't just been subjected to a random, catastrophic rockslide. Her hiding place, and a route down into the Cauldron, had been broken apart and transformed by outside hands. Specifically, by a Tremor Totem belonging to the Tauren shaman she could now see.

The shaman wasn't alone. A Forsaken rogue was tossing a dagger in his left hand, his grin made far more hideous by the fact most of his cheeks had rotted away. Behind the rogue, a black-cloaked orc warlock laid a hand on his felhunter minion, the dog-like demon snapping its teeth at the air, acidic spittle dripping down on the ground. The blood elf hunter that rounded up the foursome had an even nastier looking pet, a giant dire wolf that began prowling around to fully cut off Rielle's escape.

Rielle felt her mouth go dry. She had no idea if, or when, any backup would be coming. She was on her own against six opponents.

A moment later, she stood up. A moment after that, she worked up enough saliva to spit, drawing her axe.

"All right then. Who wants some first?"

The rogue Forsaken laughed, before vanishing into nothing. The Orc warlock barked something and the felhunter took off towards Rielle, even as the Tauren sat down and meditated amongst her totems. Rielle's eyes darted back and forth, lowering into a defensive stance as she did so.

If the blood elf hunter had chosen to fire at her at that moment, it might have been all over. But it was clear the arrogant Horde member thought the deal was already done, and watched with sadistic glee the torment that was about to befall his opponent.

The felhunter leapt at Rielle.

Rielle did not introduce the summoned demon to the business end of her axe. Instead, she took two quick steps to the left and then swung the weapon's flat end like a baseball bat straight into the creature's side. In a battle between her strength and the demon's momentum, her strength won.

In the battle between her eyes and the faint traces the rogue left as it moved, the rogue lost, as Rielle smashed the felhunter directly into the rogue, completely catching him off guard and sending them both tumbling away. Even as the two impacted, Rielle took off at a dead sprint towards the hunter, whose bug-eyed expression of shock looked even more comical on the typically haughty face of a blood elf.

The orc warlock reacted better, snarling a curse in Orcish and then hurling a bolt of shadowy destruction at Rielle. He had good aim, leading the shot well, but Rielle had better reflexes, leaping over the small explosion as it impacted on the ground. The hunter finally recovered enough to order his dire wolf into the fray, and the giant canine took off at high speed, reaching Rielle in less then three seconds.

Its mistake was trying the same jumping tactic the felhunter had. Rielle didn't counter this time: instead she went low and slid right under the jumping wolf. The blood elf almost gaped at her, even as he went for one of the arrows in his quiver. Rielle spun up as the hunter nocked his projectile, taking aim.

"RARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHH!" Rielle bellowed. She got her hoped-for end result, as the sudden noise startled the blood elf and threw off his aim, just a tad. In Rielle's case, that meant the arrow scraped her horn instead of imbedding itself in her forehead. Suspecting an intimidating shout wouldn't work again, Rielle lanced in and slashed down with her axe.

The hunter was quick, avoiding her attack and thus keeping both his hands from being severed at the wrist. He was not quick or clever enough to see that as the feint it was, as Rielle stomped on his foot and held him in place. Blood flew (quite apropos) as Rielle swung the hilt of her axe around and slammed it across the hunter's face. He went down like a sack of potatoes, and she swung her axe up to finish.

The dire wolf pounced on her, its teeth digging into her waist. Rielle hadn't been caught completely off guard though, and moved to protect herself: instead of using her axe, she dropped it, even as the impact of the wolf began to push her over. With insane speed that belied the armor she was wearing, Rielle twisted and broke away from the bite, the teeth snaring her personal packs and yanking them off in the process. The blood elf hunter was just starting to recover when Rielle seized the still-in-mid-air dire wolf and half threw half slammed the pet into its own hunter. Her axe hit the ground and was back in her hands within a second as she knelt down and snatched it up.

The warlock was whipping up another spell, red energies burning on his hands and eyes. Worse, the rogue was back, and had apparently decided stealth was for other battles. It was holding up a knife, runes alighting on it. Rielle knew, from her experience with Sognus and other rogues, what was coming next.

Even as the rogue whipped his hand out to throw the knife, several dozen others seemed to materialize out of nothing, firing in a wide arc before him. No escape. Nowhere to hide.

Rielle did neither, She charged.

Had the draenei run directly at the rogue, she would have been transformed into a pincushion. She didn't. Instead, she ran at an angle, deflecting what blades she could with her axe, several knifes still ricocheting and burying themselves in her armor. Rielle didn't slow her pace, trusting the fine craftsmanship she'd paid good money and reputation for to protect her, as she sprinted along the blackened rock of the cauldron. The rogue whipped out both primary knives to meet her.

Rielle ran past the Forsaken. It jerked its head to follow.

A second later the orc warlock finished its spell and thrust out both hands.

Said warlock had been paying too much attention to the spell: its target had just inserted the Forsaken rogue between him and her. For some spells, line of sight was what mattered.

The end result was the Forsaken bursting into flames instead of Rielle.

"RAUUUGGHHHHH!" The Forsaken yelled, doing a ridiculous dance as it fought to beat out the fire. Rielle gave a wicked grin and raised her axe.

The felhunter pounced on her, driving her onto her back. The draenei warrior just managed to get her axe hilt into the demon's mouth before it clamped onto her throat.

"Grahhhhhhh!" Rielle snarled, feeling the disgusting weight of the creature pressing down and clawing at her, acidic spittle landing and hissing on the ground beside her head as the felhunter jerked back and forth, trying to gnaw through the axe's metal handle and get at its prey.

"Bad doggy." Rielle hissed.

The knife she kept in her gauntlet sprang out as she twisted her wrist. Apparently the gnome engineers who had rigged the mechanism up actually knew what they were doing. So did Rielle, as she rammed the knife into the felhunter's throat. Its inhuman cry made Rielle feel like her ears were bleeding, but it also made the demon recoil, allowing Rielle to get her leg under it and hurl the creature several feet away.

"Play dead." Rielle said, spinning back up to her feet.

The green arc of energy struck her then, and it was like a switch had been thrown in her muscles. All of Rielle's adrenaline and battle lust abruptly died out, the alien collapsing to her knees as the weakness abruptly overcame her. She gasped at the suddenness of it, even as she recognized it. A warlock curse. She had to fight back, its crippling effects would only last a few seconds…

That was long enough for the blood elf hunter to get a shot off. The arrow struck Rielle and exploded, throwing her in a bone-breaking tumble across the ground. She came to a stop nearly twenty feet away.

Blood spilled out from Rielle's mouth as she gasped: her armor had held up but the impact of the arcane shot had been too much even for it: something was broken in her. Despite the one-two punch, she'd managed to hold onto her axe, and she tried to use it to push herself back to her feet.

The nasty humor that had been worn on the Horde's face was gone now, replaced by black hatred at how the so-called easy mark had made fools of them. Rielle knew that if they got the chance, they'd make her fate particularly ugly.

She'd tear her own throat out before she let them do that.

Even as the terrible situation loomed over her though, Rielle noticed something, out of the corner of her eye. Bright flashes of power, over a semi-distant hill. If her blood wasn't pounding so hard in her ears, she might have even heard sound to go along with the lights.

It was a brief observation, made before she returned to far more immediate matters. The Horde was spreading out again, and she doubted she'd manage to get another set of openings like she'd tried to exploit already. Worse, the rogue and forsaken seemed no worse for wear. Those damn shaman totems, likely fixing up the damage seconds after Rielle had inflicted it.

…Shaman…

…totems.

The blood elf hunter cocked another shot, this one meant to impale through the draenei's leg.

It hit the rock behind Rielle instead, as the alien forcibly broke through the remains of the curse and charged again.

Directly at the tauren shaman. The Horde had made another mistake in their anger, and left their support exposed.

The tauren, however, was not unprepared to defense herself, lifting up to her feet with a grace that matched Rielle's own, producing a black metal mace, blue runes of power shining on the head-sized orb. As Rielle closed in, the tauren lifted one foot.

Rielle struck first.

By bringing her axe down on the brown totem to the Shaman's left side. The tauren let out an alarmed snort, but was too late to stop the attack.

Attacking a shaman's totems was generally a bad idea. A shaman could restore them instantly, and worse, if you hit them when the shaman was drawing power through them, said power would be released all at one time, which never ended in a good way. In most situations, it was far too much of a risk.

This was not most situations. The madness of it all had even infected Rielle to the point where she preceded to grin at the Tauren.

"Ready to rock?" Rielle managed to ask.

The Tremor Totem spasmed once before the power within it unleashed, the equivalent of an earthquake in mid air. The shockwave of force consumed Rielle and the tauren in a dust cloud, throwing all the remaining Horde off their feet at the same time.

A few seconds later, the Tauren crashed down nearly forty feet away: the low to the ground nature of the totem had caused the force to primarily be directed upwards for her, tossing her across the Cauldron like she was a child's ball. The falling impact broke her leg, and it took her a few minutes to heal the injury and for her companions to recover themselves.

Their immediately-following hunt was intense, the four Horde members deeply eager to find the broken or dead body of the draenei warrior and properly assert their displeasure. The hunter quickly located a blood trail, and the four gave chase via it. Much to their great anger, it ended after nearly half a mile, along with some empty vials that the tauren confirmed had contained healing elixirs. Utterly furious, the hunter of the group had kept tracking, the other Horde eagerly behind him. Their rage caused them to walk into an Alliance ambush. All in all, for them, it ended up being a pretty lousy day.

Of course, Rielle didn't know the last events of the other side. All she knew was that she'd woken up from where she herself had been tossed, managed to get up (luck had been on her side when it came to landing), and stagger off until she finally managed to get her emergency bag out of its hidey-hole in her thigh armor, and bring herself back from the brink with the healing potions she kept there. Once she'd done that, she resumed bugging out.

She'd done it. She'd survived a four-on-one ambush.

If someone had told her that, in a way, the worst was yet to come, she would have laughed in their face.

* * *

"_All right Zackel." Rielle said, pausing to take a drink. "Now based on this story, let's see if you reach the same conclusion I did."_

"…_you were set up."_

"_I severely doubt I could have been so properly exposed without someone knowing I was there."_

"_They tried to kill you."_

"_No. The mages weren't THAT stupid." Rielle said, her voice becoming grim. "I think the plan was that they were going to ride over the horizon and come rescue me, Sparse probably in the lead. In one fell swoop, he'd be able to repair all the damage I'd done. 'Look, Sparse came to the rescue of the draenei who exposed him for the lying cheat he is, he must not be so bad when the chips are down. How'd she end up in that situation? She split her companions up and went off on her own?' Never mind that's a normal tactical option, all it takes is for it to 'go bad' to make the person choosing it look bad. If I made any wild accusations of them being behind it, I'd look like I had a case of sour grapes for 'getting in over my head' and needing help. And of course, Sparse would justify it to everyone that HE, the mage, saved ME."_

"…_why would…"_

"_Why would the mages go along with it? Like I said, Zackel. Nothing to get people to do something stupid like give them a sense of false persecution." Rielle said. "I don't think me being sold out to the Horde was part of the known plan, though. I don't know how Sparse did that. Maybe through that Warlock, they have that Kilrogg eye thing…who knows. The problem for them came about when Sparse decided to trust the Horde. Bad idea. Remember those weird flashes I briefly saw? Thinking back, I recognized them as magic. I think Sparse's rescue party found themselves another party, a Horde one, who wasn't part of the plan. In the Horde's case, once Sparse opened his big mouth and made his deal, they probably thought several Alliance kills were better than one. So I go no rescue effort, as the mages had to rescue THEMSELVES. I made it out alive…but things could have been different. Very different."_

"…_well…are you sure they sold you out? It might have…"_

"_One last part, Zackel." Rielle said. "You see, I didn't realize all this at the time. I've been putting it together in my head while I've been lying here in this damn fortress. When this happened, I thought I'd just escaped a very dangerous situation THAT WAS SOLELY MY OWN BAD LUCK. I might not have even suspected anything…"_

"…_so what happened?"_

"_One final assumption, I presume." Rielle said. "For all the mages knew, I DID know about their little plot. Oh, they weren't so far gone as to try and kill me…but they still decided they had to get rid of me. And they did."

* * *

_

Running away from a bad situation could be very confusing to your sense of direction, and Rielle had gotten a touch lost before she'd finally managed to get back on track to Wintergrasp. At least she hadn't run into any more Horde along the way.

Indeed, the first face she saw was friendly (so to speak). She'd spotted the Wintergrasp fortress looming in the distance seconds before she'd spotted him, the Alliance member trying to remove a frozen plant that was located at the roots of a large tree.

"Hey! Hey!" Rielle said, waving her arm. The mage's head snapped up in surprise, frozen briefly in his crouch before he stood, something Rielle didn't notice as she walked up. "Thank the light. Wait I know you…Niraband isn't it?"

"Uh yes, yes miss." Niraband Chillbreath said. He was a rather short sample of a man, his face marked with ance scars and his hair in a long greasy red ponytail hidden beneath his robes. Rielle didn't know much about him: he mostly kept to himself.

"Had a real bad run in with the Horde. I need a portal."

"A portal?" Niraband said, his eyes widening a bit. At the time, Rielle didn't notice. Later, she recognized the expression: the faint surprise of someone who can't believe something just occurred. Specifically, something that had occurred as someone had insisted it would.

"Yes. To Dalaran. I lost all my supples, and my armor's seen better days." Rielle said. "I need to restock, get repaired, then I'll use Dalaran's direct portal to come back and tell Commander Zanneth what I learned. Say wait, have you seen Fomfur or Wirekoth? I was with them, but we got separated."

"Uh…um…I think they're back at camp?"

"Really? Damn it. Must have run into Horde. More bad luck for me. I think I just used up my share for the month, if not longer." Rielle mused. "Well, I'll check when I get there. Right now, make with the portal. I'll pay you back later. Promise."

"Uh, um…okay." Niraband said in a small voice, as he went hunting in his bags. Rielle tilted back her head and sighed, trying to let her sore muscles relax. Maybe she'd treat herself to a bath while in Dalaran: her intel wasn't so urgent that the commander needed to hear it right away. The thought of it kept her from noticing the fumbling nature and over-long time it took for Niraband to manifest his portal.

"Here." Niraband said in a small voice.

"Thanks kid. You're a life-saver." Rielle said, giving a thumbs up. Unlike the last times, she DID notice the way Niraband cringed back from the motion. "What? What's wrong?"

"What? Nothing!" Niraband said. Arching an eyebrow, Rielle placed her fingertips into the shifting void of the portal, but all she got was the cold tingling that indicated an established transfer. Anyone who took mage portals learned the signs of an incorrectly-called or unstable one, if one didn't want to end up fused into a wall or at the bottom of a deep lake. Rielle could notice none of those signs here.

"Yeesh. Calm down kid. Too much tension spoils the blood." Rielle said. "Your portal's fine."

"…okay." Niraband said, his voice still small and soft.

"Right." Rielle said, as she started heading into it. "Well, see you later kid, I'll make sure to toss you a bone…"

The motion to her right caught Rielle's ever-alert, supremely observant gaze, and she turned to look at it even as her forward momentum was carrying her into the portal.

Her eyes widened in surprise. Sparse.

"BONE voyage." Sparse said.

The mage's words hit her like a fist in the gut. Something was wrong. He couldn't just be here and his words and…The thoughts tumbled through the Draenei's brain, as she tried to turn around, to confront him, to…

Too late. She'd stepped too far into the portal. It had her now, and there was no resisting it. With her free hand, Rielle reached out to try and grab the wizard. He took one step backwards to avoid it, the smug grin never leaving his face.

It was that, as Rielle went completely into the portal, that made that event the worst of them. Even against four Horde, with death breathing down her neck, she could have taken consolation that she would have went down fighting, not backing down one iota. There, she had been able to DO something, even if it wouldn't have mattered in the end had things gone different.

Here, she could do nothing. She was helpless.

That was what made it the worst, as she tumbled through a cold void and finally emerged out the other end.

Her lone consolation was that she wasn't dumped into the massive crater where she emerged: instead she landed on the edge of it, falling face first onto the ground with a pained gasp. Her wits swiftly returned, and she surged up.

The change in temperature was what hit her first. She'd gone from borderline unpleasant cold to pleasantly warm. She'd traded ice and snow for green grass, a distant forest…and a giant crater in front of her, a crater with rocks floating in the air above it and a crackling field of purple energy extending for miles around the place. Rielle stared at the sight for several long seconds, before it finally clicked.

She'd asked to be sent to Dalaran. She'd gotten what she asked, in special sabotaged style. She was where Dalaran had ONCE been.

Countless miles from Northrend and with no direct way back.

When the rage came upon her, Rielle was surprised the grass beneath her body didn't burst into flames, as she threw back her head and screamed to the heavens.

"SPPPPAAARRRSSSEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

When she was done with the litany of curses she went through, she was also surprised to see no blue air before her either.

* * *

"And just as one final kick in the ass post-note to this mess, the Kirin Tor mages that were still stationed around the crater refused to portal me back to Dalaran. Something about not knowing me. Hell, I was barely able to talk one of them into fixing up my armor." Rielle said. "Once I'd figured out where I was, and since I lacked the EXALTED reputation I apparently needed to get them to expend more effort, I stalked off trying to find the Alterac Valley conflict I heard was happening in this area. The idea was I'd find a mage there and see if THEY would be more reasonable. But I haven't spent much time on this continent: I did most of my training over on Kalimdor. I got lost. The more lost I got, the angrier I got. And when I finally heard some noise and ran towards it, and found a bunch of ogres rampaging around a certain mage…well, I needed to blow off some stream."

"And then I went and got you stuck here with me instead of going back to Northrend." Zackel said.

"Yeah, there was that too."

Zackel said nothing. Rielle, having been examining her hand, looked up to see the melancholy in his eyes. She blinked.

"I'm sorry." Zackel said. "I'm…three times over sorry. For getting you stuck here, for not having Runes of Portals…and for anything else, everything else…I'm…I'm sorry."

"…Yeah." Rielle said. "Yeah, you are."

The words took a bit to sink in, and Zackel cocked his head. He wasn't sure if she had been accepting his apology, or throwing it back in his face. Considering the dark cloud that had descended on her as she'd told the latter half of her story, he wouldn't fault her for the latter.

"Then again…" Rielle said, reaching over and picking up a log. "Maybe it's for the best what happened. If I'd been ported back immediately, I probably would have immediately tracked the asshole down and cut Sparse in half. I believe the Alliance still frowns on first degree murder…" Rielle said, leaning in to add the log to the flames. "Extenuating circumstances or not…"

The fire flickered towards her, casting her face in its light. Zackel watched…

_Flames everywhere._

_The stink of blood and death._

_Screams, distant and so close…_

_That red, laughing, laughing mouth…_

Zackel wasn't even aware of the long, thin dagger of ice forming between his clenched hands. Rielle, on the other hand, was quick to notice it.

"Zackel?"

Zackel blinked as reality violently re-asserted itself. He was back by the fire, sitting on the furs he'd worked so hard to clean.

"What are you doing?" Rielle said, still by the fire, having shifted to a slightly more wary stance. Zackel became aware of the moisture in his hands, and looked down at the weapon of frost he'd formed there. He blinked a few times.

"Uh…." Zackel said, before putting a hand behind his head, a sheepish grin appearing on his face. "Sorry, zoned out for a moment there. Must be more tired than I thought."

"Uh huh. What's that?" Rielle said, pointing at the ice knife.

"Just…a drink stirrer. Cooler. Both." Zackel said, inserting it into his summoned drink and swirling it around. "Sorry for the pointy part. That's what happens when I don't pay attention."

Rielle stared for a moment, and then crawled over. Zackel knew the forehead flick was coming, and let it happen as she leaned in and did it.

"Ow."

"Next time, do. Really." Rielle said. Zackel was about to reply, before he realized just how close the draenei was. Specifically, with how close she was, how deep her glowing eyes became.

Zackel said nothing. He just looked. At the soft illumination, and the depths within.

"Lergh. Bad breath." Rielle said, breaking the moment as she moved back to her spot. "Well, my story time is done. So unless you have something interesting to say, you might as well go take your pointy drink stirrer and go stir your drink over on your sleeping arrangements."

"Well…" Zackel said, stirring his summoned water. It was best not to tell Rielle the real reason he'd reacted the way he did. He doubted she'd like it. "My life is pretty boring."

"For some reason I doubt that will keep you from telling me anyway."

"Oh not much to tell." Zackel said. "When I was one, I was dropped on the porch. When I was two, I had pneumonia. When I was three, I got the chicken pox. When I was four, I fell down the stairs and broke six ribs. When I was five, my uncle was decapitated by a watermelon. When I was six, my parents hit me in the head with a shovel. When I was seven, I lost my index finger to my pet rat…"

Rielle cocked her head and stared.

"When I was eight, my dog Spike got hit by a harvest golem. When I was nine, my mother lost her arm to a rabid Goretusk. When I was ten, my sister was torn to bits by a pack of dogs. When I was eleven, my grandfather killed himself because I was ugly. When I was twelve, my grandmother killed herself because I was ugly. When I was thirteen, my father poked out his eyes with a pitchfork in a drunken stupor. When I was fourteen, my brother lost his hand to a carrion bird. When I was fifteen, my aunt choked to death on a chicken bone. When I was sixteen, I lost my cousin to a gnoll. When I was seventeen, I cut off my left big toe with a hoe. When I was eighteen, my father lost his right leg to the same harvest golem that killed my dog. When I was nineteen…"

Rielle tried to hide the smirk and brief chuckle: the ridiculousness had finally managed to get even to her. Zackel noticed anyway.

"I knew if I kept chucking excrement at the walls, something would stick."

This time, Rielle smacked Zackel with one of his bunched-together furs, knocking him on his side.

"I shouldn't be surprised you'd be well-acquired with excrement." Rielle said.

"I think you broke something."

"Considering how fragile you are, I would think I broke a few somethings." Rielle said. "Storytime is done, Zack. Go to bed."

"I think I'm paralyzed."

"Fine I'll kick you over there."

"I can walk! It's a miracle!" Zackel proclaimed, scrambling away from the draenei before she could inflict more punishment on him.

"No, a miracle would be if you can actually get through a conversation with me without me hitting you." Rielle said, lying down on her bedding. "Oh, and by the way, tomorrow you're cleaning the privy. It's positively WRETCHED."

Zackel groaned to himself, but said nothing. He'd been expecting that to come sooner or later.

He was starting to doze off again when Rielle spoke.

"Zackel?"

"M'yeah?" Zackel muttered.

"…you're not a bastard."

To that, Zackel again had no reply.


	8. Part Of Your World

Chapter 8: Part of Your World

Writer's Note: To WeaselNinja, no, my name is not from a GWAR song. It actually came from me noticing how many major enemies in WOW had 'Gore' in their names (Goretusk, Goremaw, Goretooth, etc). Eventually I figure by the time we get to the final content a few years down the line, they'll probably end up naming a boss 'GoreGore' because they'll have run out of names (I also postulate that by the time we get to final weapons they'll be down to 'Nice Axe 4' in terms of how dry the well will have run for autonyms for them).

Also, while you don't have to worry about me getting writer's block (I think), I do like my reviews, the longer the better. The more I get, the more motivated I feel to write. So readers, you want more, make sure to review. Anyway, story.

* * *

_Dry, stagnant air puffed into his face. Did he not remember it at the time, from the more pressing issues of his overtaxed muscles? The sense of cold?_

_It was not something he should have missed. He knew cold._

_Searching within that room, hunting for something to wash his bedding in. How long had it been since light fell on that room?_

…_why had it been sealed to begin with?_

_Something there._

_No._

_Something that should have been there. It was now gone._

_The sense of another presence, just outside the door._

_It had been so long since the door was opened._

_How long would it be before it opened again…

* * *

_

Zackel's eyes jerked open as he awoke. He blinked several times, reality fully settling back down on him. A dream. Not a very good one either, considering how tightly he was holding part of his furs in his hands. Even when he let go, red marks streaked his hands from the pressure.

"I think I need to get some food I didn't conjure out of the void." Zackel murmured quietly to himself, before pushing himself up and looking around the room. Rielle was absent, as was her weapon. Probably on her daily training run.

Zackel felt at his face, grimacing at the several days old stubble that had grown there. That, and Rielle's comment about his breath the previous night, made him go over and dig in his alchemical bags. Hygiene was a secondary concern in a situation like theirs, but cleanliness was still always next to godliness. And fortunately, Zackel had packed the several 'cleaning universal devices' he had managed to finagle from gnomes over his travels, and chemicals to aid in their tasks. Considering he had no idea when Rielle would be back, he quickly went to work mixing them up. He left one to settle as he whipped the other, and after finishing that task he left to check the roof, move any wind-carried snow, and fill up two buckets with some of the frozen mineral before coming back downstairs.

Rielle was still strangely absent. Zackel thought nothing of it, as he melted and boiled the water via the campfire and a touch of magic. Smearing the whipped concoction on his face, Zackel produced a small mirror and began to carefully shave. It was a slow, tricky process, but the end result was Zackel feeling less like a monkey's uncle when he was done.

His makeshift teeth-cleaner, use concurrently with another gnome device, was not so successful: it was so strong it burned. After a quick mouth rinsing, checking that he hadn't destroyed any of his teeth, and adding a neutralizing chemical to the mix, Zackel found the new result easier on the mouth and much, much harder on the tongue. The redone blend tasted wretched, but Zackel forced his way through it. He wasn't sure how his breath smelled afterward, but it was probably better. Maybe if he had time he could try mixing up a mouthwash.

The process of cleaning himself reminded Zackel, with a groan, what he had to clean now. Deciding not to put it off, Zackel headed to the pair's washroom to try and assess what he could do. After several long and highly unpleasant minutes, Zackel finally staggered back to the main room. He wondered if he had enough engineering skill to build a little robot to clean the bathroom for him.

Rielle was back in the room when he returned. In the back of his head, Zackel wondered why he'd felt mild concern at the possibility she wouldn't be. Where could she have GONE?

"Zackel." Rielle said, standing up from where she was putting more wood on the fire. Zackel, on force of habit, glanced to see how much wood was left (still quite a lot) before he did a double take at how Rielle was dressed.

He'd seen the Draenei out of armor before, but she'd had on leathers beneath that, in the form of pants, a shirt, and forearm padding. Now she'd removed THAT as well, leaving her in a tight laced-in-the-front brown undershirt and short-short underwear. While Rielle had always moved with a lithe, animalistic grace, it began REALLY evident when she wasn't wearing much clothing. Zackel arched an eyebrow at the sight.

"Did I seal the room TOO well? Are you too HOT now?"

"You wish." Rielle said, as she stepped onto the furs she slept on, which Zackel finally noticed she'd dragged to the center of the room. "Time to get to work, Zack. I can't keep everything top-notch by myself. I need a partner."

"Partner?"

"Sparring. Combat."

"…You want ME…"

"Oh no, I'd probably break all your bones in less time then you can pat yourself on the back." Rielle said with a one-sided smirk. "Just basic training. Actually, this is for as much your sake as mine. I can teach you to not be so soft and breakable."

"I'd like to think…"

"Blah blah blah. Get over here." Rielle said, gesturing.

"What about…"

"NOW." Rielle said with mock anger. Zackel sighed and walked over.

"So what, are we going to…"

Rielle stepped forward, and in a motion so swift Zackel barely saw it, grabbed Zackel by his front and shoved him over the hoof she'd stuck behind his legs. Zackel went down with a thud on the furs, which proved to be very beneficial in keeping him from feeling like he'd broken his back.

"Rule One. Always pay attention. No matter what." Rielle said, standing over Zackel. "I suggest you take your robe off. Probably constricting, and it might tear."

"I think I'll just lie here and think about deep, pressing issues."

"Shall I move right on to joint locks then?"

"You're not nice!" Zackel complained, semi-crawling over to his 'section' before he began removing his robe.

"Nice guys finish last. And no one likes a nice girl." Rielle said.

"Speak for yourself." Zackel said, heading back over in his shirt and pants. "Okay so what, do we start if…"

Rielle blurred over to Zackel, slammed her shoulder into his chest, grabbed his arm, and then yanked him over her body, slamming him firmly down onto the furs again.

"Rule 2. Shut up." Rielle said. "Just do what I tell you."

Shaking his head with a low groan, Zackel got up again.

"Rule 3. For now, no biting, hair pulling, or cheap shots. Believe me, you don't want to feel this…" Rielle said, indicating her hoof. "In THAT." Rielle said, indicating the usual 'worst target' of men. Zackel expected her to then insult whatever he had, but strangely she just assumed a combat stance. "Oh yes, one more thing. Do not touch these…" Rielle said, indicating the small tendrils behind her ears. "On purpose. If you do it accidentally, and believe me, I'LL KNOW, I'll try and live with it. Do it purposely, and I'll break your arm off and beat you with it."

"Right. What's next? The part where I hop on one foot? The part where I'm blindfolded? How about only being able to touch you with my teeth?"

Zackel never saw Rielle move, AGAIN. This time, she actually grabbed him, yanked him down into her hand, and tossed him up into the air, moving aside as he splatted down on the furs once more.

"Shall I reiterate Rule 2 again? I'm having a ball here."

"Bully…………for you." Zackel wheezed, getting up.

"Okay Zackel. To be serious. The primary defining force in a fight is leverage…"

What followed was nearly two hours of Zackel getting thrown, smacked, and tossed onto the ground, until his whole body felt like one big bruise. When Rielle wasn't dropping him like a bad habit, she was tying him up in knots.

"Are we done yet?" Zackel finally wheezed. "I'd like to crawl into a corner and die now."

"Just two more. Come on big man, you can handle it."

"I think I'm going to be pissing blood."

"Oh no, believe me, if I actually wanted to HURT you, I would, and can."

"What's this then?" Zackel said, gesturing before the act made him groan.

"Consider it like forging a sword."

"Right, of course I end up the metal." Zackel said. "What now?"

"Punch me."

None of the attempts at 'punching' Rielle had ended well. Neither did this one, as Rielle seized his arm and tossed him down onto the furs again. This time, she immediately surged down onto him, pressing her body down onto his prone form. Something she had NOT done before, much to Zackel's surprise.

"Now, this is dangerous. You have to get close." Rielle said. "What you do, as soon as they're pinned…is…knee up…" Rielle said, lifting herself up a bit as she arced her leg. "And WHAM, knee right into the solar plexus."

Rielle just tapped Zackel with her knee as a demonstration of the move. Zackel blinked a few times, before his focus came on a strand of hair dangling off Rielle's face. She normally wore part of her silver-black hair tied around her horns, but one strand had come loose and was dangling over her face. Zackel wasn't sure why he noticed it. Maybe it was because it was the only 'damage' he'd caused the Draenei at all.

"Then you can go for the face, the eyes, the throat, it's all good." Rielle said, pushing herself back up. Zackel got back up himself, running a hand through his sweaty hair as he did so.

"Okay, last one. Same thing."

This time, Zackel's punch got him forced to his knees with his left arm twisted behind him.

"Note how you use the person's own momentum to aid in the lock. Clinches it up tighter, gives you more control. Especially if you do this." Rielle said, before kneeling herself behind Zackel and twisting his arm even further behind his back.

"Ack, ow! I get it! I get it! Let me go!" Zackel said.

"What do you say?"

"PLEASE!"

"…beg me."

"What?"

"You heard me little man. Beg. Come on now, beg and…"

The elbow took Rielle completely by surprise, as Zackel somehow got his right arm around himself and smashed the point of it into the side of Rielle's face. Rielle recoiled, letting Zackel's arm go, standing up in mid-retreat and taking a step back, holding her face.

Zackel remained on his knees, breathing heavily for several seconds.

"…sorry." Zackel finally said. "I went too far. But so did you."

Rielle was about to say something when Zackel actually turned to face her, getting up in the process. His eyes were so intense that it actually gave her pause. She'd hit a nerve, and a big one.

"I owe you a lot. And I'm not done re-paying it. Especially after Sparse." Zackel said. "But don't ever ask me to beg. I'll do most anything, but I will not do that. Don't do it. Ever. Again." Zackel finished, his voice like ice. Rielle blinked, still holding her face.

The cold rage faded as quickly as it had arrived, and a worried, fearful look stole over Zackel's face.

"Oh crap. Please don't kill me." Zackel whispered. "I over-reacted, please I'll make it…"

"No no. I deserved that." Rielle said, taking her hand away from her face. "Hell, maybe I should be apologizing for taking too much advantage of you, actually."

"…you're not mad?"

"Zackel, Zackel. Know when the line is drawn. Even when it comes to me." Rielle said. "Besides, you're so concerned I'll want revenge…no need. You'll need me for that."

"For wha…" Zackel trailed off, as he finally became aware of his left arm lying limp in its socket. The anger, adrenaline, and fear had kept him from noticing it immediately. In delivering the elbow, he'd dislocated his left shoulder.

"…oh SHIT." Zackel said, as he realized what he'd done.

"Language, boy." Rielle said, walking up. "Don't worry. I know what I'm doing here as well. Just stand still, I'll fix it."

Rielle did. In one quick, precise motion that made Zackel feel like she'd pulled the limb off instead.

"YEEEEEEEOOOOOWWWWWWWWW!!!!"

"NOW we're even, Zacky boy."

* * *

"Ugh. Yeesh." Zackel said some time later, sitting on his bedding as he carefully uncorked one of his own healing potions. "Did you REALLY have to be so rough?"

"Life's rough, wizard. The quicker you start getting handed the hard knocks, the quicker you can learn to take them." Rielle said, now back in her normal leathers as she ran a sharpening stone along her axe. Her lone supplies left after the dire wolf had stolen her bags consisted of the healer potions she'd used, said stone, a few bandages, a badge proving who she was, and a few items she'd labeled as 'personal' and refused to tell Zackel about.

"Yeah, but really, if I wanted to fistfight…"

"Trust me. You'll end up better in the end."

"If you don't end me outright." Zackel said, before he dripped several drops of the panacea on his tongue. He leaned back and sighed as the magical concoction went to work, soothing his battered muscles and repairing the slight joint damage his dislocated shoulder had suffered. "…sorry about the elb-"

"It's fine. I mean that, Zackel." Rielle said. "If I had a problem, I'd say so. If you don't actually remember that, I WILL get angry. You seemed to actually understand me a bit. I'd rather that not be a limited notion."

"So noted." Zackel said.

"Your breath is better too. What did you do?"

"What? Oh I…mixed up some stuff. Alchemist tricks. Really?"

"Was rather disconcerting. I thought I'd ruptured something in you." Rielle said. "You DO know you'll be making some for me, right?"

"Should be doable. Now about the bathroom…"

"I'll help with that." Rielle said, resuming her sharpening. "You just better mix up something decent to clean with, Zack."

"Trust me that is a VERY high concern."

"And I get the nose plugs."

"Suddenly I think I'd be better off alone."

"Don't tempt me." Rielle said, putting her axe aside and producing her 'food pouch'. "Dinner's on."

Zackel stared.

"What, are you deaf? Come on, or I'll eat it all myself." Rielle said, as she took out one of Zackel's pheasants.

"You're not going to make me eat the bones to toughen up my stomach or something like that, are you?" Zackel asked as he walked over.

"Stick some food in your mouth, mage, or I'll feed you my fist instead."

Zackel didn't say anything else. He just conjured some drink and ate quietly with his erstwhile companion.

"I will admit." Rielle said when the meal was nearly done. "It WAS a nice elbow."

"Uh…good, I suppose."

"Well, in a broken clock is right twice a day style."

"Hardy har har." Zackel said, drinking from his canteen. "Is there ANYTHING I can do to impress you?"

"Stick your hand in the fire?"

Zackel looked at Rielle for several seconds, pretty sure she wasn't serious.

Then he lifted up his right hand while he waved his left hand around it, muttering under his breath. The appendage became encased in ice, which Zackel promptly shoved into the flames. Rielle stared, as Zackel quickly removed his hand from said flames, the ice having mostly cracked and fallen off, a few slushy remains dripping down his wrist.

"You did not say how long and in what fashion." Zackel smirked.

Rielle promptly delivered her becoming-trademark forehead flick, the blow as usual knocking him backwards.

"Be glad my response was of the same length and fashion, mage." Rielle said.

"Yeah…probably best."

* * *

"…where the heck did you get THAT?" Rielle said a short time later.

"What, this? From my bags." Zackel said, a small wooden table with a grid surface in front of him.

"How did you carry…"

"Magical carrying capacity. Very useful thing."

"Why would you waste the space on that?"

"You have your way of keeping sharp. This is mine." Zackel said.

"A small table."

"Actually it's a game. Ever played Thrust?"

"I'm not one for games…"

"Well then, please indulge in one of the many other entertainments available here." Zackel said, waving an arm around.

"You'd best watch it mage, or I'll make up a game that involves how many times I can hit you until you get knocked out." Rielle said, before she sat down. "What is this, that game where each piece is a different thing and can do different things?"

"No, that's Conquest. Or chess, as it's called in some places I believe." Zackel said. "This is Thrust. It's played with these." Zackel said, producing two small bags that he opened, dumping small black and white playing pieces on the board. "It's played by each player placing pieces down on the board. The object is to have more 'territory' then the other player: you get points based on that, and whoever has more points at the end wins."

"That doesn't sound very interesting."

"The key is, if a player surrounds another player's stones with his own, like this…" Zackel said, putting several black stones around two white stones. "Then the stones are 'captured', removed from the board, and no longer count. Ergo, it's very much the classic easy to learn/difficult to master game. You have to balance offensive and defensive moves, decide whether and when to branch out or stay in, think ahead of your opponent, etc etc. It's very much like a fight, actually."

"…..fine. I'll play black. If you cheat, I'll break the board over your head."

"Wait wait. First I'll play you a teaching game or two. Show you the more complicated rules." Zackel said. "I'll also give you a handicap, since you're new. Basically, the game will start as if you already have a certain number of 'un-capturable' stones. I think a 20 stone handicap is more than fair there."

"Are you calling me stupid, little boy?" Rielle said, though there was no venom in her tone.

"No Rielle." Zackel said. "I'm giving you my form of hard knocks. Get ready."

* * *

"And…done. That makes the score 62 me, 48 you. Not bad Rielle. You're closing the gap." Zackel said several hours later. Rielle glared at the board, as if willing Zackel's pieces to run away from her and concede her the win. Considering she hadn't won once in the dozen or so games they'd played, it was a pretty intense glare. The stones remained unimpressed despite it.

"You're a dirty cheater." Rielle said, gathering up her stones.

"You want a bigger handicap?"

"NO! I'm going to beat you. I'm getting you down, wizard boy. I'm figuring out your small little mind, and I'm going to stomp on it." Rielle said. "You don't have much in the way of moves, I found that out today! Just wait…just wait…"

_One game later._

"Still waiting." Zackel said, turning a piece over in his fingers.

"You suck." Rielle said, drinking from her own canteen. "Next one's mine."

"Perhaps." Zackel said, as the pair began another game of Thrust. They played in silence for several minutes, before Zackel paused, staring at a stone.

"Oh come on, aren't you dominating me enough?" Rielle complained.

"Hmmmm? Oh, no…just thinking Rielle. Just thinking."

"Well, if you're going to sit there and think, can I ask you something?"

"What?"

"How long have you been at this?"

"Playing Thrust?"

"No, adventuring."

"Oh. I started two weeks after the Dark Portal incident."

"…why are you HERE there?"

"What?"

"Zackel, I might insult you, but even I realize you're not an idiot like Sparse. _Sparse _made it all the way to Northrend. I don't know how long _he'd _been doing his work, but still." Rielle said. "You clearly have talent. Yet you're wandering around the Alterac Mountains looking for Dalaran cast-offs. I wouldn't have been surprised if I'd met you at Northrend, though my opinion of you might be considerably lower. Yet you're here. What gives?"

"I'm just proceeding at my own pace. What's wrong with that?"

"In a perfect world? Nothing. In a perfect world my species wouldn't have been chased for thousands of years and you know that story. Azeroth needs elite adventurers. You could at least have a CHANCE at that, considering how you play this board game, how well you improvise stuff with what you have on your person, this damn blizzard, fel, you even take a beating pretty damn well. Yet in terms of advancing yourself, you're not doing much better than stagnating. Why?"

Zackel was silent, turning the piece over in his hand some more.

"…look, if it's personal…."

"It is. But that's all right." Zackel said. "You got wronged by mages, Rielle. Let's just say you're not exactly alone."

"What?"

"Magic's a troublesome business. It changes you, in so many ways." Zackel said. "Sometimes it's obvious, like Sparse."

Zackel stopped turning the piece around, staring at it as it stood suspended between two fingers, as firelight flickered on his face.

"Sometimes though…it just sneaks up on you." Zackel said. "Her name was Jasciona. Jasciona Core."


	9. Why We Fight: All That Jazz

Chapter 9: All That Jazz

There really was no other term for her: exquisite was the first thing that came to Zackel's mind. Dressed in a simple farming outfit, as were about half of the people gathered in the Wizard's Sanctum, the young woman had closely cut red hair, jewel-like green eyes, and an almost perfectly oval face that looked like it had been carved by a sculptor. A touch of dark makeup around said eyes almost made them seem to flash whenever she turned her head. Which was not often, as she was paying close attention to the man speaking to the assembled youths. Zackel had only spared the girl a few seconds before turning his own attention back to the man.

"Let us get one thing clear immediately: none of you are special." Maginor Dumas said. Dressed in robes of purple, gray-green, and gold, and with his hair mostly gone, only remaining in two brown- gray sheets that covered his ears, a neatly trimmed chin beard complementing the look, the Maginor did not look like much on the surface. Zackel could tell there were a few of the fifteen or so gathered students who thought just that. Zackel also knew they were idiots: the Maginor, to him, pulsed with enough concentrated power to flatten them all with a gesture, and make sure none of them were ever getting up with two. "Perhaps in your communities you believed you were somehow exceptional, able to decide the rules that should be followed. That is not the case here. You were not brought here because of any innate wondrousness, you were brought here because all of you have demonstrated the potential to be a vital part of Stormwind's defense. The world has suffered much these past years, and new evils continue to crawl from the darkness. You WILL be made ready to answer it, or you will be cast out-"

Dumas whirled, smashing his staff down on the foot of a snickering youth. Said youth recoiled with a yell, his chair tipping over and spilling him onto the floor.

"Now, would anyone else like to try and undermine the gravity of what you are tasked with? I assure you the gravity will win." Dumas said, as the youth groaned over his injured appendage. "Lord Nefarious and Ragnaros are not going to defeat themselves. You will be needed to replace those that will give their lives to stop them, to protect those who were not given your gifts. Those gifts will carry you against whatever threats rise in the future. It is a lifelong burden, and I have tasked myself to teach you all to carry it. There have been far too many failures in the ways of those who have wielded magic, and it has brought the world much suffering. Such tragedy will not come from my class. It will NOT come from you. Do you understand?"

"Yes teacher." Zackel said with all the other students.

"You had best." Maginor Dumas said. "Go to your rooms now. Your first lessons begin tomorrow, at the crack of dawn. If you cannot get out of bed, you will be dragged out. Dismissed."

"Takes himself seriously, doesn't he?" The young man next to Zackel said.

"As should we, Daldion."

"What? Who are you, and what did you do with Zackel? You know, the guy who thought scaring people by pretending to swallow live chicks was a riot?"

"He's still here. He's just sleeping for now." Zackel said, looking at the muscular, brown-haired youth. "That gnoll attack could have been a lot worse, Daldion. A LOT worse. I don't want that to happen again."

"You and me both. Just don't let the Zackel I know suffocate in his box."

"Please. It's just like the sleight of hand that let me do that chick trick. I'm just making sure you're looking another way. " Zackel said, glancing around the room again. When he did, the girl was gone.

* * *

"You have exceptional eyes."

"Huh?" Zackel said, looking up from where he was sitting on his bed. He was mildly surprised to see the girl walking into his dorm room.

"Mind if I sit?" The girl said, taking a chair and doing so, crossing her leg as she settled.

"Sure." Zackel said. "Jasciona, isn't it?"

"Jasciona Core." Jasciona said. "We're in the same class."

"Yes, that rather goes without saying." Zackel said, closing his book. "Something I can do for you?"

"You're not like the others, Zackel."

"Pardon?"

"The other boys in our class." Jasciona said, leaning on her chair, her red hair a striking contrast against her white novice's robe. Both she and Zackel had been issued them on the first day of 'magic school': it was now a week later. Zackel had spared Jasciona a few more glances during those days, but had mostly been paying attention to the Maginor's lessons. He certainly hadn't expected her to come into his dorm room.

"I'm not?"

"I've seen you, looking at me." Jasciona said. "The boys look at me like meat. They drool and fantasize, and are poor at hiding it. You don't do that. You assess. You acknowledge. You have the eyes of someone who doesn't just seek what he wants, but seeks what is best as well, in all things."

"Um…thanks?"

"Want to go have a meal at the Blue Recluse?"

Zackel stared, feeling his mouth briefly go dry.

"Are you…asking me out?"

"I don't see how I could be more direct." Jasciona said.

"…I'm flattered Jasciona, but…why me?"

"Ah. Not all-wise then." Jasciona said. "This is rather lonely for me, Zackel. There's only one other female in this class, and she's apparently decided I'm her rival. With how hard teacher is training us, you need a friend. From all of the boys, you seem like the best bet for a friend, at least. Though if you want, I can always go try and find someone else."

"Well…uh, sure. I meant the meal! Not the finding someone else! I'll go!" Zackel said, reaching for his desk. "Let me get my money pouch…"

"We'll play darts there." Jasciona said. "Whoever wins foots the bill. And the next one."

"Right. Next one. I must warn you, I'm not bad at darts."

"I'm not bad at ANYTHING." Jasciona said, that brief glint flashing over her eyes.

As it turned out, her assessment was correct. As it also turned out, Zackel didn't mind paying.

* * *

"_Wait wait wait, the girl just walked into your room and said hey, let's go hit a bar? Tell the real story. Make sure you include all the stalking and wearing down you had to do."_

"_Ha ha." Zackel said, without much humor. "No Rielle, that's really how we met. She came into my room and asked me out, I accepted, and we went and had fun. She wasn't wrong about the training being a lonely business. I had a few friends among my peers, she didn't, really. Mostly the guy's fault for being so damn obvious with their horn-dogging. She told me later she'd been asked out by four of them before she came to talk to me and she turned them all down, and three took it with the usual maturity young men have, if you catch my drift. So she decided to assess me, up-front, as a way to fix that. And we clicked."_

"_You also need to include all the awkward, terrible poetry you probably wrote those long nights thinking about her…okay okay, I'll stop. Continue."_

"_Well, we meshed well. We had similar mindsets, similar interests, and she was FUN. She embraced her learning so she could use her magic to enjoy life to the fullest. She had a great wit, a razor-sharp mind, and an ability to read people like no other. It's how she noticed me, after all. After our fourth date, we took the plunge from friends to lovers…and what we had maintained itself. Yeah, maybe it wasn't the most stable time, what with Nefarious, Ragnaros, those damn bugs over in Kalimdor, oh and of course King Wrynn was missing during that time as well. Yet it was great. Jasciona, or Jazz as she liked to be called, she and I thought we could do anything in the world. More Jasciona then myself._

_That was the thing, you see. She wasn't just beautiful and smart. She was good. Really good. At the time, I didn't really recognize it…"

* * *

_

"Jagrafress…grafress…" Zackel said, struggling to read the tiny handwriting of the magical tome he was studying. "Fress, fress…hadro…ga…no, JA…"

"Jagrafess-Hadrojassic-Maxarodenfoe." Jasciona whispered into Zackel's ear. He'd heard her coming, and despite that fact still started a bit. "Still have a touch of nerves I see, Kel. That probably explains why you continue to owe me money."

"Maybe I let you win." Zackel retorted. That got his face gently shoved into the book. Zackel raised his head to emit another retort, only to start violently sneezing from the dust thrown up by the action. Jasciona, now sitting on his bed, laughed delightedly at the fact.

"I swear you bring something new in your wake every time. This time it's allergies." Zackel said, producing a handkerchief to blow his nose.

"Oh poor baby. Are you looking for an excuse to get out of class?"

"I might need one. This is damn hard, and I'm not sure I'm ready to be tested on it." Zackel said, peering back over his book. "You made it this far yet? Wait, stupid question, you knew how to say this stupid word which I am half-convinced is made up to confuse and frustrate me."

"I finished that book nearly two weeks ago."

"…really?" Zackel said, glancing back and forth at the book and his girlfriend.

"JAGRAFRESS!" Jasciona declared, a bouquet of flowers appearing in her right hand. A purple-pink shield swiftly surrounded it, and she hurled it against the nearby wall. It bounced off like a ball, and Jasciona guided it back to her hand, smiling.

"I'm also almost through the follow-up book teacher gave me."

"No fooling." Zackel said, looking back down at his book. "Yeesh. I knew you were pulling ahead, Jazz, but at this rate you're going to lap me."

"Jealous?" Jasciona said in a mock-prideful tone.

"In all honesty? Yes. Maybe more than I'd like to admit." Zackel said, looking up from his book. Jasciona's smile faded from her face. "But I'll live with it. I'm not going to be like Adaric and wash out in the first month just because the teacher won't 'admit how awesome I am.'"

"He was the second guy to hit on me. I knew he wasn't anywhere NEAR awesome after that." Jasciona said. "But hey. At least you get to be near someone awesome."

"Really? Who?"

Jasciona hurled her shielded flowers at Zackel, but with a quick magic word of his own he stopped them and brought them hovering over to his hand.

"I said I was behind, Jazz. Not THAT far behind." Zackel said with his own grin, and dispelled the shield and vanished the flowers up his sleeve in three quick motions.

"That's my man." Jasciona said, standing up and giving him a quick peck on the lips. "Keep studying. Because I'm not stopping. For you, or anyone."

Zackel knew it, as Jasciona left his dorm room. He knew, deep down, if Jasciona had thrown the orb at him with any real aggression behind it, he would have taken it square in the face.

"All that, girl. You certainly are." Zackel said, and resumed studying.

* * *

"_So what happened? She tried to run before she could walk?"_

"_Not exactly. Maginor Dumas recognized her incredible potential quickly, of course. But he meant what he said when he spoke to us our first day. He wasn't going to be known as the one who taught the next Medivh." Zackel said. "He structured her teaching to make her remember that she still had limits, and that true mastery lay in accepting them and then defining them, rather then forever trying to cross over them. Even if he'd been a poorer teacher, I…think she might not have done so badly. She had…a good head on her shoulders. For someone as lovely and as talented as her, it was amazing. She was truly blessed. I tried not to forget that fact while we were together."_

"_Jealous rival perhaps?"_

"_Oh she left Gliven behind in the dust almost immediately. I think the poor girl was so humiliated that she actually became a better mage out of it. Didn't really know her too well." Zackel said. "Actually, if we're going to lay blame, I never met the guy who started the ball rolling. I believe his name was Vialin Snarljaw."_

"_What he'd do?"_

"…_well…maybe nothing that wasn't inevitable." Zackel said. "Considering what had just happened the day before he 'got involved.' It had been several months since we'd started training, and most of us were starting to go on controlled field missions. Serving as backup for Stormwind guards for disturbances, small stuff to get us acquainted with real combat. Well, Jasciona and I came back from separate ones the same night, and since we were both tired and didn't want to be bothered, we took a room in the Recluse's small inn instead of going back to our dorms…"

* * *

_

"So how did you make out?" Jasciona said, dropping her bags onto a stool.

"Oh just a little excitement. Some Defias set their dogs on some farm animals. I froze the dogs in place, the guards cut them down, the Defias ran away. They sent someone after the bloody buggers, I don't know if she caught them or not. You?" Zackel said.

"Oh, I had _excitement._" Jasciona said. "We were escorting a merchant. Said merchant decided to lie about what he was carrying, which happened to be gems by the way. A lot of them. Apparently he wasn't as careful guarding this information as he thought he was, because two-thirds of the way there we got ambushed by a whole PACK of those damn Defias. I think that your Defias actually ran to join them instead of away, there was so many of them."

"What? Shit." Zackel said. "Did you lose the cargo?"

"On my watch? Fel no. It was just a pain having to deal with all of them after the guards panicked and ran away."

"…you did what." Zackel said in a small voice.

"Well, I dropped three of them with one blast, and that made the REST of them angry, so they all tried to stick their pointy things in me, and since I had no backup at all I had to run around like a scared rabbit and dodge thrown knives and slingshots! Finally I tripped and fell in the damn mud, and the Defias decided to stop and laugh at me, which clustered them nicely so I could brain them all with ice from above. Then I had to wait for the guards to come back with reinforcements. These hands are not meant for tying thugs up." Rielle said. "And then I had to stay muddy all the way to Lakeshire when we started off again. Thank the light for said lake, or I'd still look a mess."

Zackel sat silently on the bed, trying to wrap his head around what Jasciona had told him. She'd…faced off a band of Defias thugs by herself? And come out just dirty?

"Jazz…how many were there?"

"Who knows, I lost count after eight of them."

"Eight of…"

"Kel, enough. It was a bad day and I don't want to talk about it." Jasciona said. Zackel's lack of response made her turn her head to face him. "What? Druid got your tongue?"

"…It's just…I…you…" Zackel said. "You're amazing. Just…amazing."

Jasciona let the honesty of the words sink in, and a soft smile appeared on her face.

"Yes, I suppose I am." Jasciona said, as she approached Zackel where he was sitting on the bed. "But…I know that well enough. Don't wanna be amazing…"

Jasciona pushed Zackel back a bit before she straddled herself on top of him.

"Wanna _feel_ amazing." Jasciona whispered. "No more work. Time to play."

The kiss was deep and intense, Jasciona lowering herself and Zackel down on the bed. She broke it after several seconds.

"For your next trick, make my clothes disappear."

Zackel just kissed her again, drawing his hand up her robe and hooking the waist line of her pants…

* * *

"_Whoa whoa whoa, stop stop. You can just fade to black, Zack. I don't need those details." Rielle said._

"_Well, I was going to."_

"_Good."_

"_After the part where I literally charmed her out of…"_

"_LALALALALALALALA YOU ARE NOT IMPRESSING ME." Rielle said in a sing-song tone, even going all the way to stick her fingers in her ears. "I don't want to hear you lie about how good you are in the sack. Get to the interesting part."_

"_Lie? Hmph." Zackel said, placing his Thrust stone down before he continued. "Okay fine, we made some magic. Then…"

* * *

_

Some couples snuggled after sex. Some engaged in pillow talk. Some smoked, though Zackel considered that a filthy habit that dwarves seemed to have an odd fondness for. Zackel and Jasciona mostly did the first two, and something unique amongst a magical couple: post-coitus magical demonstration.

With the sheets loosely wrapped around him, Zackel was sitting in the middle of the bed, Jasciona leaning against the head of it and watching him. Normally her bare chest would have been a distraction, but with Zackel having already dealt with such things that would draw his attention in such a way…

_("Several times."_

"_OH YOU LIAR!" Rielle said, lightly smacking Zackel in the head. "Don't bring this up again, because unlike you I really can 'hit it' several times!"_

"_I'm going to have a permanent soft spot on my head by the time we go our separate ways." Zackel said, rubbing where Rielle had struck him.)_

…He was able to focus on what he was doing, which was summoning magic between his hands.

"Sycofrax….sycofrax…" Zackel said, cold energies gathering between his semi-wiggling, semi-clawing fingers. Jasciona watched, her cool green gaze both analytical and curious. Blue mist began forming between Zackel's hands, and with a grunt he slapped them together and drew them apart. On his hand, a small ice statue of a ballerina was now standing on one delicate leg. As Jasciona watched, it began to slowly spin.

"Dah-dee-dah-de-dah-dah-de…eh, I kind of suck as a music box." Zackel said sheepishly.

"You have other talents." Jasciona replied, reaching out towards his hands. The ice ballerina drifted over to her hand, and Zackel lowered his own as the small statue continued to spin on Jasciona's.

Jasciona looked at the statue.

A new surge of blue mist flowed up, even as the ice Zackel had already summoned began to shift its shape. Zackel watched, and swore he saw a literal spark of energies surge across Jasciona's eyes as her own product took shape.

A replica of a mother wolf sat on Jasciona's now, tiny puppies running around and playing around her. Zackel stared for several seconds, swallowing as he did so. She'd topped him, without a word or gesture. Maybe no one from this class would be the next Medivh, but Zackel honestly wondered if he was looking at the next Aegwynn.

"I can't even come close." Zackel said, shaking his head.

"Don't underestimate yourself, Kel. Maybe I can sprint and you can go the distance." Jasciona said, dispelling the ice creation she had made. "You haven't disappointed me yet."

"I should think not."

"Come here." Jasciona said, drawing Zackel in for another kiss.

The low, thudding boom coming from outside the room stopped it cold. It was one of the few times in Zackel's magical training that he didn't like something that could be considered that way (that is, cold).

"What was that?" Jasciona said.

"I don't know…" Zackel said, stealing out of bed. He located his underpants and began pulling them on.

The next thud was considerably louder, and Zackel could swear he heard yelling and screaming.

"Okay, nothing good." Zackel said, and headed directly for his staff, which was propped up against the wall with Jasciona's.

The door blew off its hinges and nearly took Zackel's head off in the process. Jasciona screamed, throwing up a sheet to cover herself, even as Zackel hit the ground in painful fashion with his own yell. He looked up with alarmed eyes at the hole in the wall where the door to their inn room had been, and once again felt his mouth go dry.

Filling the space was a giant mass of malignant shadow, two glowing embers serving as eyes being the only defining marks on the beast. It's clawed shadow hands could easily have wrapped around Zackel's whole torso, and it brought with it a chill that shot through Zackel both in its intensity and its unnatural nature.

A Voidwalker. Zackel had no idea where it had come from, why it was here, and how the hell it had gotten past all of Stormwind's guards.

He didn't really care. It was here. And Zackel's staff and mildly enchanted clothes, along with Jasciona's, were propped against the opposite wall and all over the floor, respectively.

"_**Accursed…FLESH…"**_ The Voidwalker rumbled, starting to slide into the room.

Zackel had a feeling that whatever grudge the demon minion had against him, and his flesh, he really didn't want to know how the creature would act on it.

"_**Suffer…rend…"**_

Now he was sure of it.


	10. Why We Fight: Gone Baby Gone

Chapter 10: Gone Baby Gone

"…_Once there was a man whose prison was a chair." Zackel said, once again turning a Thrust stone over in his fingers. "The man had a monkey, they made the strangest pair. The monkey ruled the man, it climbed inside his head. And now as fate would have it, one of them is dead."_

"……_what?" Rielle said. "When I talked about bad poetry, I didn't meant for you to spout some off in mid-story."_

"_Oh it's not random. It's just something that's come to my mind, since that night." Zackel said. "His name, as I found out, was Vialin Snarljaw."_

"_Who?"_

"_Precisely. He was the warlock whose actions caused the Voidwalker to invade my room. He was born with some sort of bone deformity, made him unpleasant to look at and very painful for him to walk. I suspect the problems of such a life were why he tried to become a warlock." Zackel said. "I suspect your species doesn't have much to do with warlocks, for obvious reasons, and I don't know about your personal experience."_

"_Mostly, I killed them."_

"_Not surprised." Zackel said, still turning the stone in his hand. "There are two kinds of warlocks, Rielle. There are the one who wish to turn fel magic into a force for something resembling good, even if it's just in their head…they're not all fools. Exceptional wills can twist any kind of power to their desire. Even the dark magics of the Burning Legion. As an old saying goes, it is not the hunter's rifle that does the killing. And considering it wasn't warlock magics that sundered the world all those eons ago…"_

"_Yeah yeah. Get to the point."_

"_Right. Then there's the other kind of warlock. They fill the ranks of all you killed. They seek dominance and power, believe light is weak, that only the dark gives true strength. They are puppets and fools." Zackel said. "Power is like a monkey on your back, Rielle. You can either tame it, let it ride on your shoulder, and feed it to keep it happy and content, and by extension yourself…or you let it control you."_

"_Ah." Rielle said, in a tone that she now understood his poem._

_Then she flicked Zackel in the forehead again. At least she used a light touch this time._

"_The point. Get to it."_

"_Right…" Zackel said. "Vialin was the latter. If I'd led his life, spending so much time in pain and being shunned for something I had no control over…I might have been drawn to the warlock arts myself. But even though Vialin had 'the gift' for such things, it didn't help his deformities. Nor did they help him: from what I've learned, it slowed down his studies, made him a mockery all over again. His teacher tried to channel his rage into 'the art'…either he didn't do a good enough job or Vialin was simply a lost cause. Instead of seeking revenge, though, Vialin decided to do something else. He decided he'd show what a talent he really was by doing something a warlock had never done before."_

_Zackel stopped twisting the stone in his grip, and after a few seconds' pause finally put it down._

"_It got him killed. And he wasn't the last."

* * *

_

Zackel, back then, didn't know as much about warlocks. There was some basic information about them in certain magical books, and human and gnomes who practiced such dark magic could occasionally be seen skulking about towns and cities (though the smart ones kept their demon minions sealed away and tried to pass as something more accepted). He did have an inkling, acquired via osmosis in some place or another, that a in-training warlock would often be seen with a Voidwalker, though Zackel didn't know why.

He learned when he went for his staff again. The voidwalker was faster, its hand of shadows surging out and seizing Zackel. Its ice-cold body seared Zackel's skin, but that was nothing compared to the agonizing lance that went drilling into the mage's heart, mind, and soul.

_YOUR MOTHER SHOULD BE DEAD! YOU WANTED TO SCREW AROUND INSTEAD OF HELPING IN THE TOWN'S DEFENSE! YOUR FATHER COULDN'T WALK FOR WEEKS! IF YOUR RESCUE PARTY HAD BEEN A MINUTE LATE AND LACKING THOSE TWO DWARVES YOU WOULD HAVE FOUND YOUR MOTHER ROASTING OVER THAT GNOLL COOKING FIRE! SHE STILL BLAMES YOU! YOUR MOTHER HATES YOU! YOUR FATHER HATES YOU! YOUR BROTHER HATES YOU! YOUR LOVE WILL SOON HATE YOU! WEAK, DESPISED LITTLE __**RAT!**_

"_**-CKYOU!"**_ Zackel half-slurred and half-screamed. If he'd had anything resembling tactical sense left, he would have set off an arcane detonation from his body, both to release himself from the Voidwalker's grip and drive the demon back. But anything resembling sense had been destroyed under the Voidwalker's violating grasp, and instead all Zackel could do was manifest a dagger of ice and begin stabbing it repeatedly into the demon's head.

A poor choice. While the Voidwalker didn't shrug it off, it expressed its displeasure by throwing Zackel across the room.

To add to the misfortune, Zackel managed to find the lone window.

Frost armor, summoned by instinct, turned what should have been Zackel ripping himself to shreds on the glass and then breaking several bones on the landing on the grassy route in front of the Recluse into a mere several (albeit nasty) cuts and a deep chest bruise. Spitting said grass and dirt out of his mouth, Zackel began scrambling up, his mind clearing from the Voidwalker's despair miasma and filling with a brand new despair that managed to spike even higher when he heard Jasciona scream once more in the room above.

"JAZZ!" Zackel shouted, running for the door of the tavern.

He made it two steps before the whip lashed around his neck and jerked him backwards, the scorching length burning itself into his throat even as it began to cut off his air. Before he could even get back up, a clawed hand reached down and seized him by the hair, pulling him up to look into a pair of blazing fel eyes.

"Fresh meat." The succubus said, licking the blood off Zackel's face. "Delicious."

* * *

"_You see, Rielle, as warlocks grow in power, they make pacts with stronger demons. Vialin's problems had kept him from doing this quickly, or rather as quickly as any of his fellow 'students' had. So he decided he would show all his peers, and jump ahead of them in one fell swoop. He would summon a voidwalker and a succubus at the same time, and turn them both into his minions at the same time."_

_Zackel fell silent. Rielle waited, having placed her stone down as he'd finished speaking._

"_Vialin was 'smart' enough to realize he could have some trouble doing this. He hired two cheap mercenaries to serve as his backup if needed. He was NOT smart enough to realize that if you hire people on the cheap…you get what you pay for." Zackel said. "He was also not smart enough to realize why warlocks are supposed to perform these summons one at a time. I forget the exact details…but the nature of the transfer from the Twisting Nether or the Fel Abyss or the Bad Things Box or wherever the fel these things are summoned from is weird. In the process of stabilizing the creature as they're called from one realm to the next, the transfer process can imbue them with extra power. If they're summoned one at a time, this boost is negligible. However, if you say, SUMMON TWO AT ONCE, HENCE MAKING THE TRANSFER PROCESS LONGER…"_

"_I get it."_

"_I don't know if Vialin didn't know that, didn't learn it, didn't BOTHER to learn it, or knew what he was doing and was arrogant enough to assume he could handle it." Zackel said. "He couldn't. The demonic minions ripped him to pieces. Same with his two mercenaries. And then, since said demons were empowered to a higher degree than the norm, they didn't immediately get dragged back to their place of origin. And since they had no master to give them orders, they proceeded to rampage through the Mage Quarter looking for victims. And before the guards and magicians could properly wake up and mobilize, they found me. And Jasciona."_

"…_if you don't want to give details…"_

"_Ah, that's the rub, Rielle." Zackel said, picking up another Thrust stone. "What happened next was not what you think."

* * *

_

"Precious little toy…" The succubus cooed, even as she dug her claws into the side of Zackel's head. Zackel hated himself for it later, but the action aroused him as much as the claws hurt him. However, he had not lost enough sense to completely stop fighting, his free hand erupting in destructive power.

The succubus caught him by the wrist in mid-strike, a vicious twist stopping his attack cold. Even as she stopped him, she transferred her other hand from his hair to his throat, holding Zackel up by the still-wrapped around his neck whip.

"Now now, let's not play rough…yet." The succubus purred, licking her lips. "Come with me to the shadows. I'll show you joys you'll scream your lungs out for."

"Go…back…" Zackel rasped, and that was as far as he got. His will was being sapped, all his sense and decency being sucked into the demon's eyes, promising events of such hedonistic atrocity that it would be to die for. And he'd die happy.

The true agony would come after…

"Seal it…with a kiss…" The succubus whispered, drawing Zackel in.

The entire upper floor of the Blue Recluse exploded, throwing the succubus backwards with a yell of surprise, breaking the hypnotizing gaze the demon had on Zackel. He shook his head, his mind flooding back to him, but before he could do anything the succubus let out a growl of irritation and briefly let go of Zackel's throat to backhand him across the face. Stars exploded in Zackel's eyes, his head feeling for a moment like it was about to break right off at the neck, and he went limp, slumping to the ground as the succubus watched the smoke erupting from the upper tavern floors with narrowed eyes.

Jasciona sprang from the smoke, drifting down to the ground with far more grace than Zackel had shown. The sheet she'd wrapped and semi-tied around her was hardly flattering or properly covering, but the burning intensity in her gaze was what drew all the attention, as she stood up from her slowed fall and looked at the demon she'd found. With a laugh, the succubus hauled Zackel up and turned him around, wrapping an arm around his neck as she dug her claws into his cheek.

"Your property? Mine now." The Succubus laughed. "Finders keepers, and you clearly can't keep a man."

"Let him go." Jasciona said.

"Oh you don't give the orders red. Oh, how interesting: the carpet mat-"

That was as far as the succubus got, as Jasciona snapped up her arm with a speed a hunter would have done a double-take at and sent a blast of purifying fire out that smashed right into the succubus' face and reduced everything above her chin to charred bits and wet ash.

The whip vanished into smoke, Zackel falling once again to his knees as the demonic creature tumbled backwards and fell to the grass with a barely-audible thud, already dissolving into foul ichor and mephitis. Jasciona ran to catch her boyfriend before he completely fell to the ground.

"Zackel…oh damn, Zackel…"

"Jazz………..?" Zackel choked, his throat and his head fighting a war over who got to hurt the most.

Jasciona's reply was cut off by the soul-chilling bellow that sounded behind her. Turning to face in the direction of the Recluse, Jasciona watched as the Voidwalker pulled itself from the same smoking room she'd come from.

"_**HURRRTTTT ME!" **_The Voidwalker shrieked, surging down to the ground, seemingly even bigger than before. _**"HURRTT YOUUUUU!"**_

Sparks of energy shot from Jasciona's eyes, surging down into her hand as arcane magics exploded to life with a speed and intensity that brought Zackel back to full alert.

"No." Jasciona said, opening her hand and then crashing the fingers shut.

The bolt of fire streaked down from the heavens and impaled through the Voidwalker like a spear from the Titans themselves. It shrieked, throwing its arms wide in the sudden torment…as the several other pillars of fire tore down and found their mark on it as well. The Voidwalker did not so much disintegrate as it was literally flash-fried right off the face of Azeroth, the heat setting the grass and the front of the Blue Recluse on fire.

With every bit of it directed away from Zackel and Jasciona. If that had been normal fire, they would have both been cooked to a crisp.

Fire manifested and control by a hand that bordered on divine did not do such things.

"…Zackel?" Jasciona said, turning her head back to her boyfriend. Zackel could only stare at where the Voidwalker had been. "Are you all right? Zackel?!"

"…gone." Zackel murmured. He was vaguely aware of distant yelling and footsteps, as Jasciona hugged him close.

At the very least, he served as a half-decent cover for Jasciona's indecent form until the arriving help brought her a blanket.

* * *

"_Man. You just get whipped from all over, don't you? Even the Burning Legion's lining up to do it." Rielle said._

"…_you might say that." Zackel replied. "The kick to the teeth my ego may have or may not have taken is secondary though. I always knew Jazz was strong. When the chips were down, the worst she did was act startled when danger abruptly came calling. She recovered and took it down swiftly thereafter. All by herself. With no help from me, but again, that's secondary. What mattered…in the end…was that a pair of empowered demons was set loose inside Stormwind. And Jasciona, while essentially stark naked, took both of them out inside a minute. No staff for focus or additional power. No magical accoutrement to give an extra boost. No time spent channeling spells, or distractions to make sure her hits counted. Hell, she even managed to do a Slow Fall spell WITHOUT A REAGENT, which is not unheard of I'll admit, but she did it like it was par for the course. She saw, and she conquered." Zackel said, Rielle fully expected Zackel to comment on the nature of when she had come, but a look at the depressed retrospection on his face quickly answered the question why she didn't._

"_Well…it's not like you ran away or threw her to the wolves, Zackel. Hell, if I got attacked while naked I'd probably be in trouble too…"_

"_That wasn't what mattered in the end. Maybe." Zackel said. "What mattered was what she did. It got notice. It was one thing to be a gifted student. It was quite another to be exposed to such an unexpected, dangerous trial by fire and come out of it making fire your literal bitch."_

_Zackel placed another Thrust stone down._

"_I did my best that night. I know I did. It wasn't enough. Hell…all of it was for naught in regards to what happened next anyway. I was irrelevant."

* * *

_

"Teacher?" Zackel said, standing with some surprise in the open door of his dorm room. He had not expected to find the Maginor sitting in his study chair. He thought he'd said all he needed to say the previous day, when he and Jasciona had been interviewed over what had happened three nights previous. It had been the last time he'd seen his girlfriend, and he'd been heading to his room to get the special charm they'd worked on together, so he could try and track her down.

"Hello Zackel. Sit down." Dumas said.

"Is something wrong?" Zackel said, worry tingeing his heart.

"No, nothing wrong…nothing serious anyway." Dumas said. Zackel really didn't like his master's tone, despite his words, and crossed over to sit on his bed with notable trepidation.

"I wish to discuss you and Miss Core." Dumas said. Zackel wasn't really surprised at the Maginor's words. It still made him wince.

"Teacher, if I may speak first…" Zackel said, pausing to see if his master was going to cut him off. When he didn't, Zackel continued. "I never recalled you mentioning anything about relationships being forbidden between your students. If they are and I somehow completely missed it…I love the woman, master. I want to be the best I can be, but I'm not going to…"

"No Zackel. This is not about that." Dumas said. "If I'd had issue with your relationship, I would have raised it long ago, as you surmised."

"Then what's wrong?"

"I'm afraid Miss Core has left us."

"What? She…what, ran away?!"

"No. Far from it." Dumas said. "She has been taken by the Kirin Tor."

"The Kirin Tor?! I thought they were on our…"

"She's not been taken against her will, young man." Dumas said, a trace of dry humor in his tone. "They heard about the demon incident. Rather, one of their own in town for supplies witnessed it, and got in touch with his superiors in Dalaran. They came to visit, to see Miss Core for themselves. They concluded that what happened several days ago was no fluke. That she had so much magical potential that they decided my training was not enough. They requested for her to come with them to Dalaran for specialized, elite training. And she has accepted."

"…she did? They did?" Zackel said. "When is she leaving?"

"She already has."

Zackel stared.

"She asked for me to pass her farewells onto you. She said that she was sure you'd understand."

"…_I'm not stopping. For you, or anyone…"_

"Do not take this personally, young man." Dumas said. "I am aware _you _are aware of your love's ambitions. She wanted to seize them. If you truly have something worth keeping, then you two will find a way to keep it."

Zackel said nothing, staring at his clenching hands.

"I'll give you some more time to recover from these events, but I cannot go easy on you Zackel. What I said on the first day I began teaching you has not changed. You, Miss Core, your brother, Gliven, all of you have possibilities to go far. I know that you always wanted to embrace those possibilities. Before Jasciona, and with her." Dumas said, standing up. "If you throw it away because of this…I cannot stop you. But my disappointment with you will likely only be outweighed with your own disappointment in yourself, down the line."

"…I…" Zackel whispered. "…yeah…I understand."

"…good." Dumas said. "I believed you would."

"Can I have an address or…"

"I'll have Ethybaen come straight up with all necessary information to keep in contact with Miss Core." Dumas said, leaving the room. "I look forward to both your progresses'."

"…right." Zackel said, standing up and looking at the mirror before feeling at his neck. The burn marks had been healed by local priests, but sometimes Zackel could swear he still saw them.

Saw what the Voidwalker had brought barreling through his mind.

Saw himself completely failing as a protector and as a man, even if there were considerable extenuating circumstances and the fact that those involved didn't care about such things, or really need them.

"Progress." Zackel said.

He did not get much sleep that night.

* * *

"_Let me guess." Rielle said. "You never got a letter back."_

_Zackel was silent._

"_You think what happened in the inn that night made her think you were pathetic, unmanly, not worthy, a boy, a…"_

"_I think your point was well put across with the first three theoretical assessments, thank you." Zackel said curtly, before lapsing into silence. "I wrote her the next day. A few days after that. A few more days after that. And more than a few times after that. As far as I know, she was getting my letters. My teacher swore up and down that he saw to it. Maybe he was lying…maybe they were lying to HIM, I don't know. But I never got a response. It was like she'd just disappeared out of my life. Like all we'd built and enjoyed together was swept away."_

"……_I'm sorry."_

"_Not yet." Zackel said. "It hurt, but I had an escape. My training. So I trained and learned, and I justified the lack of response, theorized maybe they weren't sending HER letters, or maybe the training was just that intense. The Kirin Tor have always had a bit of a chip on their shoulder, and even more so after Aegwynn, Medivh, and the mess Arthas made of them during the Third War. They probably wanted a success, and I had no doubt Jasciona could be just that. So I tried not to let my feelings get in the way of the 'greater good'. I was sure Jasciona would do the same."_

_Regarding a Thrust stone once again, like the playing pieces held all the secrets of the universe, Zackel slowly placed it down, keeping his eyes on the board._

"_I thought the knife being in my heart was how bad it was going to get." Zackel said. "I was wrong. Seven months later, the twist happened."

* * *

_

"Well…" Zackel said, his feet up on the table in the Guilded Rose. "I have had just about enough doing my part for Duskwood's never-ending worgen problem. I think it's time to move on."

"Hear hear." Daldion said, drinking from a mug and slapping away a gnome rogue's hand when she tried to snatch it when Daldion put it down. "Knock it off Silonna."

"Awwwww." Silonna Slightedge grumped, sitting back down on the large book she'd placed on her seat. "So where to next then, boys?"

"Boys? I'm here too." Iberama Greatshine, a female priest, complained.

"Yes you're here too. What happened the last time you chose a direction…oh yes we wandered into Deadwind Pass and ended up being chased by ogres for ten minutes before we discovered they have a hard time avoiding trees when they run through forests." Daldion said.

"You're never going to let me live that down, are you?"

"Not planning to." Daldion said, and dodged the remains of a bread roll Iberama threw at him.

"We could go to Stranglethorn!" Silonna said, eyes shining with the eternal energy all gnomes possessed.

"Ugh." Zackel said, dunking his own bread roll in the remains of the sauce of the dish he'd finished. "I don't like Stranglethorn."

"You've been in Stranglethorn ten minutes at most!" Iberama said.

"Yes, and those ten minutes showed me just how pleasant wandering through it for ten hours, days, or weeks will be." Zackel said. "It's like a giant, sweaty hand is always clutching you when you're walking around Stranglethorn. Maybe I could get used to it, but ugh."

"Why don't you just mix up some chemical to make yourself stop perspiring Kel?" Daldion asked.

"One, I'm not that good yet. Two, that would create more problems than it solved. Three, we do have other options." Zackel said. "Maybe we should go up to Menethil, take a boat across the sea. See if Jaina needs any help over on her little colony."

"Have you heard the latest rumors about Jaina and Thrall?" The last person at the table, a human hunter named Astaukon Gleanlance, finally spoke up to ask, having been busy cleaning his gun beforehand.

"Yes. Several versions. With varying degrees of smut." Zackel said. "I don't need to hear any more and I hold no opinion one way or the other."

"Speaking of rumors-!" Silonna began, as Zackel, Daldion, and Iberama groaned, knowing what was coming. "The latest news about King Wrynn is that the Horde trolls have long reclaimed Echo Isles and are keeping the story that they were kicked off it as a cover for holding him captive!"

"Best hope not. They'd probably grind up the king for a special spice to add to their dishes." Zackel said.

"Hey. Trolls aren't THAT bad. Darkspear trolls anyway…" Iberama said.

"You just haven't met the right one yet Iberama. Or the wrong one. The right wrong one. Trust me, they're…"

"Hey! Zackel!" Came a call, and Zackel turned around as one of his fellow mage students (though that was mostly a glorified concept now, as his lessons with the Maginor were all but done, and Zackel's interactions with him primarily consisted of being sent on tests of skill), a skilled polymorpher named Crierin Twineshift, ran in and nearly tripped over Astaukon's napping lynx pet, Sickle, in the process. The lynx regarded the mage with a cool look of annoyed rage, and Crierin quickly regained his balance to more quickly scramble around the table.

"What is it Crierin?"

"Are you still with Jasciona?"

"….yesssssssss…?" Zackel said, his eyes narrowing.

"Well I just saw a big bunch of Kirin Tor wizards heading through the Trade District, and I'm pretty sure I…!"

Zackel didn't bother hearing the rest of Crierin's sentence, able to guess its context. Instead, he jumped out of his chair, leapt over Sickle (who gave Zackel's disappearing back another cool look), and ran out of the Guilded Rose without a second look.

"You'd best hope you're not playing a prank on him, Crierin." Daldion said. "Or he's going to be pissed off when he gets back."

"Why would he get pissed off?" Crierin said. "I never said I saw her for sure. Besides, what's the worst that could happen?"

Daldion felt the sudden urge to draw a sigil in the air and spit, as if he was trying to ward off a curse.

Later, he realized it wouldn't have done much good.

* * *

Kirin Tor wizards were hardly difficult to spot: they wore purple robes, clustered together, and were able to make commoners, merchants, and just about anyone else get out of their way without the need for giant, armed guards. They also could move surprisingly fast for being on foot, as Zackel struggled to first catch up to them, and then try and get around and ahead of them so he could see who was there.

"Pardon ME."

Zackel wasn't sure where the Kirin Tor mage came from. He must have snuck it from outside of Zackel's field of vision as Zackel was trying to look at the other Kirin Tor mages. Said out-of-nowhere mage took advantage by grabbing Zackel by the shoulder and starting to push him aside.

"Hey, wait! Wait a second!"

"The Kirin Tor has no interest in second-rate conjurers, stranger. There are no positions for you to acquire, and you will not waste the arch-mages' time in trying." The Kirin Tor said. His eyes had a strange milky tint to them, though as far as Zackel could tell he didn't seem to be blind. Arcane tattoos traced on his face managed to make its semi-ratty nature go from weak to intimidating. He was also fairly wide, in a way that suggested girth and not fatty bulk. Despite having nearly a head of height on him, Zackel didn't think he'd win in a physical struggle.

"I don't want a position! I want to see if…"

"You can join gawkers another time. Be silent, and gone."

"You don't understand! I think I…JASCIONA!" Zackel yelled at the departing Kirin Tor. "JAZZ! JAZZ!"

Zackel had hoped that one of the mages would stop. He did not expect then ALL to stop.

"…Now you've done it. The light help you." The milky-eyed mage said, stepping away. The Kirin Tor member who turned to face Zackel was most definitely NOT Jasciona: for one, it was an old man, and an old man who looked like someone had taken a branding iron to his face a few times. Zackel doubted he could have told when the man was happy, but the damage to his features didn't disguise the air of waspish annoyance surrounding him.

"State your name, fledgling." The burned-face mage said.

"I am Kel Wintersoul, grand master." Zackel said. He didn't know if that was actually the mage's position, but he had no doubt that he knew more than Zackel. Zackel, however, knew a thing or two as well.

The problem was, he didn't know them well enough for Burned-Face to not catch it.

"…you have the gall to give me a false name?"

"With all due respect, grand master, I don't know you well enough to know whether or not that is the best option." Zackel replied, as the concept that he perhaps should have substituted more respect in place of his caution began to occur to him.

"You impious little speck…!"

"That's enough Zygmunt." Another Kirin Tor wizard said, stepping forward and holding arm out between Burned-Face/Zygmunt. He wasn't as old or as battered, but the aura of being annoyed at Zackel was not completely absent with him either. "What do you want, Wintersoul? We have far graver business…"

Zackel was about to speak when one of the other mages moved. He saw the slight motion, the touch of red hair…

And for the first time in a while, he felt like a weight had been lifted off him.

"I…believe I know that woman." Zackel said, pointing. "I just wanted to see if I was correct. Just…say hello, and leave you be."

"…Jasciona? Do you know this man?" Second Kirin Tor Mage asked, turning towards the figure.

Jasciona Core turned to look at Zackel.

The smile forming on his face died before it could begin. The weight came crashing back down on him a second later, heavier than ever before, as the two looked at each other from where they stood, Jasciona's face as lovely as ever…

And her gaze as blank as if she was looking at a sign.

For a second, Zackel thought that somehow, her memories had been wiped. The next second tore even that possible comfort apart. There was still a glimmer of recognition in Jasciona's eyes…and nothing else.

The chill that ran through Zackel was colder than any ice he'd ever manifested.

"…no sir." Jasciona said, turning away. "I'm not…who he thinks I am."

"Very well then. Be on your way, mage." The unnamed Kirin Tor mage said, turning and heading off, the rest of the clustered wizards following in his wake. The tattooed one spared Zackel another glance as he passed him, but even he could tell Zackel didn't even realize he was there.

"…………..no." Zackel said. It was the one, and only thing.

A brief time later, his companions found him, and as anyone could expect, many inquiries were made.

Zackel didn't answer any of them. He didn't answer anything at all. He held his silence, and the second he could, he withdrew himself from their presence and went elsewhere.

He had no time for words. All his efforts were devoted to thought.

It was a long, long cruel road.

* * *

"_So she just…"_

_Zackel held up a hand. Rielle uncharacteristically fell silent herself._

_Without any further commentary, Zackel picked up another Thrust stone, and began the final part of his story.

* * *

_

The silence had not fallen from him, those several hours later. Zackel sat in the table at the back of the Blue Recluse, stretching out the one drink he'd purchased by constantly paying for new ones he told the waitress to not bother drawing up. It seemed like the cracks of the table held some immutable, magnificent pattern, the way his gaze never lifted from it.

Not until the shadow crossed it. Zackel looked up at the lone person who had approached him after so long alone. He was not surprised who it was.

"Zackel." Jasciona said, drawing her hood back. She'd grown her hair out, and her ears were now pieced and decorated with earrings that Zackel recognized as power focus charms. His assessment earlier had not been wrong: she was as lovely as ever. This time, her face was kinder, more familiar, as she leaned her staff against the wall and sat down.

"I'm so sorry." Jasciona said, reaching out and taking Zackel's hand. "You don't know what I've been through since we last were together. I knew the Kirin Tor would be hard, but I never dreamed…I haven't slept in three weeks, Zackel. They have spells for it, and I've adapted…they have no time for dalliance. I've had to really put my nose to the grindstone to make my way through it. It's changed me, I know…but Zackel, I got your letters. You expected this. Expecting things to change. They haven't changed that much! I mean, when you just showed up on the street, I couldn't just run and hug you, it's just not DONE…but you didn't deserve that lie, and I'm so sorry."

Zackel didn't say anything, as he lowered his head again.

"It's all right Zackel. I've gotten out of their clutches for now. I still have to go back, but Zackel…the things I've learned…I never thought…you won't BELIEVE the knowledge, the power of those men and women! They're merciless, but they're even greater than their legends. The things I could do, _we _could do…I can leave them eventually, maybe even soon, I can teach you…we can make our mark on _history_…"

"Jasciona…" Zackel said, stopping the redhead's semi-torrent of emotion.

When Zackel looked up, he took his hand away from hers.

"You once told me I had exceptional eyes." Zackel said, pointing to one of them. "Maybe. They've seen a lot. They saw someone I loved, who I knew was better than me, and they accepted that sight. They saw the ambition in her, the desire to be the best…and they accepted that sight. They saw the possibilities about how hard your training could be, how it could change you, how it had to accept that sight is not the same as mastery, and that sometimes things happen that you may not like…and as hard as that was, they tried to accept that sight. Then today, they saw you."

"Zackel…?"

"They saw a look that went right through me. Not a woman who had greater responsibilities that had to go before happy times. Not a woman who had been wandering the dark for so long that the sudden return of the light shocked and blinded her. Not even a woman who can say she was changed more by outside factors than by own self, in all its glory and lack thereof." Zackel said. "I thought I might see something like that, Jazz, if we met in the presence of your teachers. And I expected that is how we'd see each other again. But…I _knew_ I'd see something else. A wink, a hint, the slightest twinkle of the woman I knew, down in the basement until she could finish her work in there…and instead…I saw nothing. I've sat here and pondered it all, and weighed if it was possibly my failure. Maybe it is. It hasn't changed the decision I've come to."

"…You…what…?"

"I will always love you, Jazz." Zackel said. "But I see something else now. I'm not seeing the true self I sought, and believed was in, 'All That' Jazz.. I'm seeing what Jasciona Core has become…after several hours of thinking over the glimpse of what she was, in me. I know you feel regret. But it's too little, and too late. More than the lack of letter response, more than our distance between us in power and potential, more than every single possible reason I thought of for why our relationship might be over…I never realized that circumstances might just take us apart. But when I saw you, I knew."

Zackel looked, one last time, in his former love's face. At the pain and shock there…and the coolness that was coming up to take control of it. Who she was now.

Not the same. And that was all that mattered in the bitter end.

"I guess it's fitting that the blessed eyes become a curse in the end. It's how so many stories reach their conclusion." Zackel said. "I think it's time for you to go."

"…you're…breaking up with me?" Jasciona said. "Because I didn't answer your…because I didn't stay how…because you think you _ever had a right to…!"_

"No Jasciona. I'm not breaking up with you. I'm letting you go." Zackel said. "I wish we could pick up the pieces and start over…but you're not the same. Me…I am, and that's why I decided this. And the words that you just spoke…tell me I'm not wrong in doing so. And you know it too."

In the end, Jasciona's eyes never ceased their calmness, as she looked at Zackel for several more seconds before standing up. With a gesture, she called her staff to her hand.

"Stay alive, Zackel." Jasciona said. "Goodbye."

With a swirl of regal purple robes, Arch-Mage Jasciona Core turned and walked out of the Blue Recluse, and out of Zackel's life. The hired help didn't bother Zackel any more, as he left some more coins on the table and headed up to the room he'd rented for the night.

It wasn't the same room he'd had, they'd had, that fateful night. Despite that fact, Zackel found himself sitting at the desk in the room, staring at the mirror in front of him for seemingly an eternity.

Finally, he raised his hand and began calling shivering blue power up into his hand, crafting it with his mind. After about fifteen seconds, an ice ballerina once again spun on his palm.

"Dah dee…dah-de-dah…dah-de…" Zackel whispered. "De dah…dah…dah dah…"

The ballerina shattered as Zackel closed his hand on it, and with a sudden scream he stood and began pounding on the desk before him, hitting it until the pain of his bloody, twisted knuckles finally overtook the brief, overwhelming rage at everything. He sank back into his chair, holding his head over his aching fists, taking long, slow, gasping breaths.

The lone tear that fell crystallized from the residual frost power. The rest of them slid down Zackel's face, as he looked up at his reflection, and all that lay within.

It held no answers. In that, it was a fitting embodiment.

Zackel, in the end, just had a word instead.

"…………………Goodbye."

* * *

"And I never saw her again." Zackel said, putting the Thrust stone down. Silence settled over the room, the fire having burned low during the long conversation.

Rielle said nothing, merely cocking her head.

"To this day, I don't know if I made the right choice." Zackel said. "I don't know if I was projecting my own fears and whatnot onto her, if she really hadn't changed and I couldn't just see it, if I was the one who ruined everything, if I was the bad guy…maybe. All I know is what I saw. And what I saw was a different person. Not hardened, not cold, not pitying…just different. And I knew what we had was gone. I spent all that time after our eyes locked thinking it all through, before Jasciona approached me wondering if we could ever get it back, in some form or another…"

"And you couldn't."

"No. It was gone. As far as these eyes, flawed or not they may be, could see." Zackel said. "Just another young pair of lovers who grew apart. So I ended it before we could bring more pain into each other's lives. Better to cut the infected finger off, sometimes, then wish for it to heal and have the whole arm become infested with rot, and beyond. And if I did it…not because I assessed that it was no longer going to work, but because of my own failing…then I didn't deserve her."

Rielle again said nothing, briefly looking down at the Thrust board and then back up at Zackel, who was holding his chin, the way it lowered his face casting his eyes in shadow.

"You ask why I was looking around here, Rielle, when you feel I could be at Northrend. You're right. I could be. But after that night, I made a decision. About my power, and myself." Zackel said. "Power is not innately corruptive, I feel, despite all the arguments I am sure many could make about fel magic, Queen Azshara, and all that. If it was, then Jasciona would have never been the girl who I fell in love with, and who loved me in turn. But it changes you, Rielle. No matter what, it changes you. In her own pursuit of it, it changed Jasciona. Not into something bad, not into something lesser…but into something else, regardless. And in that, what we had was lost. After that, I decided I would approach my studies as I saw fit. I would advance at my own pace, and on my own path. If Azeroth so desperately needs me to barrel headlong down the road to strength and destiny so I can properly answer some call, well, Medivh is free to fly in my window and get his propheting on. If not, then I'll decide what I'll become, and when. Without it changing who I am. I don't want to bring that pain back. Or onto anyone else. It's as cruel as any wound or poison you could think of."

Zackel raised his hands, coiling his fingers into semi-fists. Rielle realized, when viewed up close, that faint bands of scar tissue could be seen all along the knuckles.

"Healers can repair damage to a great degree, erase wounds and the disfigurements that remain after like they never happened. It's why I suspect you're not a great big mass of scar tissue despite all the combat you've seen. I had a druid fix my hands, but I asked them to leave the scars there. That I wanted a natural reminder of my decisions. So he did. And so I have it." Zackel said. "I still have dreams, ambitions, and I know how dangerous the world is. How I could play a role in its defense, in some way. My decision stands, regardless. I will keep my monkey on my shoulder. It will stay there, and nowhere else. Until the time comes when I feel that's not enough."

Zackel placed his last Thrust stone down, studying the board.

"…I resign. You win." Zackel said, taking a drink of water as Rielle's eyes widened slightly.

"…wait what? Hold it, I just…we shouldn't just…!"

"I'm not throwing you a pity win, Rielle. Check the board." Zackel said, shifting slightly as he began gathering up his bedding. "I've had enough for the night. Time to sleep."

Rielle didn't protest, intent on counting the stones as Zackel rolled over to rest. She put a finger to her lips as she finished up: from her rudimentary knowledge, she had won by three points, and there was no real way for Zackel to make a comeback.

"…son of a bitch." Rielle said quietly.

"Please don't talk about my mother that way." Zackel murmured. Rielle glanced at the wizard, and then a ghost of a smile crossed her face, as she moved back over to her bedding and began preparing to sleep herself.

If she had any further opinion about Zackel and Jasciona Core, she did not give it that night.

--------

She did, however, give an opinion when the sound of a clatter and someone falling with a curse woke her out of a light doze some time later.

"And perhaps someone should have cleaned up their game board instead of just rolling over and forgetting about it."

"Thank you Rielle." Zackel said, his grouchy tone drifting out from the dark. "I'll keep that in mind."

* * *

"_So far away we wait for the day…  
For the light source so wasted and gone…  
We feel the pain of a lifetime lost in a thousand days…  
Through the fire and the flames we carry on…"_


	11. Skin Deep

Chapter 11: Skin Deep

Journal Entry No # 442

_Storm persisting. Might even have fresh snow, which should not be happening. V. Annoying. Realized yesterday all it would take to be free is for one of the remaining Dalaran wizards near mountain to wander up here and notice the unnatural magic nature of the storm. Further realized this unlikely because lazy Dalaran wizards need blasting powder to get them to move an inch out of the books they're likely perusing during their easy duty watching a crater. Or the scrub duty. Or whatever it is._

_Stupid Dalaran wizards. Certain Sparse trained by them._

_Despite continuing storm problem, solved another one. Actually managed, over last few days, to clean privy. Really am quite amazed how many chemicals and reagents I was carrying in bags. Good timing to put off re-organization, one realizes. Managed to make crude scrubbing tools and mop via locating another cast-off ogre fur in castle. Too far-gone to even try and clean for bedding, so cut up and soaked in chemical mixes. Made cleaning solution via the dozen or so buckets we'd managed to find, boiled water on fire, and went to work._

_Harder than any monster I ever killed. Might be because I let Rielle use the nose plugs though. Honestly wonder if ogres instill fel energy in what goes into them for when it comes out. Nothing normal should make that smell. Some say you get used to bad smell in time. They liars._

_But, done. Somehow. Originally going to burn cleaning rags. Decided fire didn't deserve that and just tossed them out onto the roof of the castle. Not care much for feelings of snow. It why we stuck here._

_Writing too late again. Journal makes less sense that way. Wonder what Rielle has planned for tomorrow. Can't think of any more chores.

* * *

_

"…what?" Zackel said flatly.

"I want a bath." Rielle said, sitting on the lone table the pair had. "I helped you with that LOATHSOME stopgap we call the facilities, and quite frankly after watching you do all your little alchemist tricks I damn sure deserve one."

"Um…okay." Zackel said, scratching his head. "Well, did you find the castle's bathing chambers?"

"The ogres used it for another toilet."

"Say no more." Zackel said. "Well, I'm not wholly sure how I can…"

"Quit talking, mage. I have a list." Rielle said.

"Oh Rielle, I thought we were past this part of our relationship." Zackel said with mock disapproval.

"Not as long as I have this, Zack." Rielle said, holding up her axe. "Now get to work."

"…you haven't given me the list yet."

Zackel still hadn't gotten Rielle's speed down. At least this time she just poked him in the forehead.

"What part of quit talking did you not get?" Rielle said. "Shall I say it slower? QUIIIIIIITTTTTTTTT TALKKKIIINNNGGG…where are you going?"

"To get snow." Zackel said, walking off. "Maybe I'll get back by the time you're done with the flaunting."

"Oh believe me Zack, you wish I would flaunt myself."

"Oh believe _me _Rielle, you want NO PLACE in my wishes." Zackel snarked, as he stepped out of the room.

* * *

"_First things first clever boy. I want soap. PROPER soap, not that stuff you used on the furs and our privy."_

"Ask and you shall receive." Zackel said, working over one of the buckets. He'd taken fireplace ash, and mixed in a few alchemical components which he was now stirring slowly.

"Move faster!" Rielle said, (very) lightly smacking Zackel on the back of the head.

"Ow." Zackel said. "This isn't a case of stick chemical A in potion B, Rielle. Unless you want my mix to melt your skin off, you'll let me do this at the proper pace."

SOME TIME LATER.

"Test it on yourself." Rielle said, holding out a piece of fur.

"Pardon? And where did you get that?"

"I thought ahead and cut up one of your blankets."

"You WHAT?"

"Kidding. I cut off a piece of mine. Better sponge than your excuse for hides." Rielle said. "Soak up the soap and test it."

"Right. Did that include dripping it into my eyes? Because if it does I'll just skip the middleman and ram my head into the bucket."

"Don't. It'd be a waste of a good bucket."

"It really says something about my life that I've been reduced to goblin levels of demonstration." Zackel said, stripping off his robe, trying to roll up his sleeve, and then finally getting annoyed by his sleeve refusing to roll up and just stripping his shirt off.

"Wooooooooooooo." Rielle said, in the fakest possible enthusiasm she could muster. Zackel mostly ignored the draenei, as he found some grime in a corner and rubbed it on his arm.

"Dirt." Zackel said, demonstrating his arm as he soaked the makeshift sponge/scrubber in the soap and water mix he'd made. The dirt easily came off as he ran the soaked fur up and down it. Clean water from another bucket rinsed the limb with no sign of injury or irritation.

"Tah-dah. It's GONNNEEE."

"Just put your shirt back on, I can't decide whether to fall into hysterical laughter or start vomiting."

"Why don't you just combine the two, you can choke on your own vomit and put me our of my misery." Zackel said, loosely buttoning his shirt. "Give me a second to add one more chemical. Make sure you smell nice afterward."

"Are you saying I stink?"

"I'm saying you've spent a fair bit of time sweating and cleaning an EXCEPTIONALLY unkempt lavatory."

This time, Zackel dodged the flick to the forehead. Though he was pretty sure she let him see she was coming.

"Didn't deserve that one." Zackel said, commenting on his unlikely (?) dodge.

"Just finish your soap. And don't take your shirt off to test it, I need these eyes."

"Fine. I'll take off my pants instead."

"Please don't, the end result probably WOULD have me laughing until I vomit."

* * *

"_Next I want water. Lots of hot water. You're the magician, make with the magic!"_

"I have to wonder what you'd have done if I was say, a hunter." Zackel said, boiling several of the wooden buckets over the fire, using his mage talents to prevent the buckets themselves from catching on fire and to properly heat the water.

"Probably would have killed you and eaten you by now. Then I wouldn't care if I stunk." Rielle said.

"So you admit it then."

Rielle's axe buried itself in the wall near Zackel.

"And your aim still hasn't improved I see."

Rielle waited until Zackel was done boiling the water before she tossed him out of nowhere on her piled bedding.

"OW! What was THAT for?"

"Considering it an item off the next training bill you'll be getting."

* * *

"Okay then. Main tub filled with water, buckets filled with more water, a proper soap, a sponge, you're done with me. I'll just wander downstairs and see if I can find anything new amongst the…" Zackel said.

"Not so fast." Rielle said, producing her dagger.

"Now what do you want, for me to poke holes in the bottom of one bucket to make you a shower?"

"No. Your robe." Rielle said, tossing the knife to Zackel. He let it fall to the floor. "Hey!"

"I still consider this the wiser course of action." Zackel said, bending over and picking Rielle's knife up. "Now what's this about my robe?"

"Cut a strip off it."

"WHAT?" Zackel yelled. "You think this is just some piece of clothing woman?! It's precisely inlaid with enchanted threads and weaved in a specific way to better serve in my minimal-as-it-is protection and my spell casting efforts and why the fel do you want me to cut a strip off my robe?"

"Your blindfold."

"What?"

"Because of you I have to bathe in that." Rielle said, indicating the tub. "You're helping. And believe you me, you are not getting ANYTHING out of it."

"…………………what." Zackel said. "Do you…"

"Strip!"

"What?"

"Cut the strip off, Zack."

"………you know, if you really want to do it this way, I could just close my eyes."

"Ah ha ha. No. Strip." Rielle said. "And believe me, I'll be watching. You peek, I'll rip your eyes out and shove them up your rectum so you can watch me kick your ass."

"………….you have no idea how nice I'm being to you." Zackel said, as he began pulling off his robe.

"Oh yeah, and before you do, make some more of that face-tidying stuff you used. I want that too, and forgot to ask before."

"ARGH!"

* * *

"Now that's tied tight now?" Rielle's voice said into Zackel's ear.

"Yes." Zackel said with deep irritation, now blindfolded with a small piece of what had once been his robe. "Perhaps I shall provide entertainment for you as well? Do a dance while you perform your desired hygienic acts?"

"Nah, just stand there. I'm getting enough of a laugh. You're certain you can't see?"

"NO."

A second later Zackel felt the edge of Rielle's axe lightly pressed between his legs. He was pretty sure he paled a great deal at the realization.

"…is that REALLY necessary?"

"Perhaps." Rielle said, removing the blade. "I know men, after all. You can't help…"

Zackel found himself almost flying off his feet as Rielle did another combat throw. Lacking any form of sight, he'd had no idea it was coming and would have had an incredibly painful landing on the stone floor had Rielle not caught him in turn.

"……………………convinced NOW?" Zackel said, his cross tone coming out more gasp-like then he would have liked.

"No that was just for my own amusement."

"My whole LIFE is for your amusement now."

"You're catching on." Rielle said, guiding the blind Zackel to a certain spot. "Stand there."

Zackel did so, arms crossed, his shirt still untucked and semi-buttoned from his earlier demonstration. He heard Rielle stripping out of her clothing, and slightly sensed motion as she stepped into the tub in front of him. He debated asking if there was a point to this, and decided he didn't want to get smacked in the face with a wet fur-sponge and continued standing there.

"When I ask, bend down and hand me one of the buckets." Rielle said.

"Right then." Zackel said, staring at the darkness that was his world now. He heard water dripping and splashing as the alien cleaned herself in front of him.

"Ah…"

Zackel arched an eyebrow.

"……mmmm."

Zackel had absolutely no idea if Rielle was continuing her parade of head-screwery or if her noises were genuine. A period of silence left Zackel 'in the dark' some more.

"Ahhhhhhhh…"

"You all right there?"

"Let a lady enjoy her bath in silence, mage." Rielle said, flicking water onto Zackel's chest. "Need a bucket soon."

"Right." Zackel said, leaning over and hunting around. He located one and stood back up, listening to more faint splashes and squishing noises.

"Ahhhhhhhhhhh…bucket please."

Zackel held it out, and Rielle slipped it out of her hand and poured it on herself, judging from the noises Zackel heard.

"Arm out." Rielle said. Zackel slowly held out his arm.

"To your side I see. A gentleman." Rielle said, slipping the bucket over Zackel's arm. "Wait there."

Zackel did, as Rielle bathed and did whatever other tasks she had wanted to do (she'd asked for his gnome cleaning tool as well), Zackel occasionally handing her another bucket of rinsing water. Judging from the noises she kept making, she thoroughly enjoyed herself.

"Am I done?" Zackel finally asked after about thirty minutes and seven buckets. Rielle's response was to lightly place the empty bucket over Zackel's head. "Oh this is nice. All that and this too. Very nice."

"You've EARNED very nice, Zackel. Just as long as you do one more thing." Rielle said, taking Zackel by the shoulders and turning him around. "Walk until you find the wall. Sit down. Stay there until I give you the signal."

"Right. You're not going to throw the empty buckets at me for target practice, right? Or decide now is the best time to practice the martial arts created to fight your ancient bucket-headed enemies? Oh I know, you've directed me to walk into the fire, so you get an amusing dance out of me after all."

"Get moving." Rielle said, giving Zackel a push. Zackel walked, hands out, until he found the wall and sat down, removing the bucket from his head as he did so. He heard Rielle stepping out of the makeshift bathing tub, and he sighed and drummed his fingers on the floor as Rielle did the slow-drying process in front of the fire.

At least until he heard it. The faint shuffle of what sounded like feet.

"What was that?" Zackel said, turning his head.

"What was what?"

"I heard…something? A noise?" Zackel said, standing up. "Sounded like a creak. Like someone's on the stairs."

"_What?_" Rielle said.

"Rielle, where's my staff?"

"It's across the room…"

"I need it…" Zackel said, stripping the blindfold off, being VERY careful to keep his head tilted away from where Rielle's voice was coming from. He still heard a small gasp. "I'm NOT LOOKING. NOT LOOKING…"

Zackel fumbled his way across the room, locating his staff and heading back for the open door.

"NOT LOOKING. NOT LOOKING…gentleman, remember?" Zackel said as re-assurance as he reached the door. "I'm going to go check it out. Don't do anything I wouldn't do."

"I don't think I could live long enough to do all that."

"Still not funny…" Zackel's voice drifted through the door as Rielle heard him going down the stairs.

"Hmpphh. Probably was running out of the ability to resist peeking. Pervert." Rielle said, turning back to the fire. Now having a sense of semi-urgency, she began rubbing down her body to try and dry off faster. The fact that such an act would have been an even BETTER show never occurred to her. Combing her hair with her fingers as best she could, Rielle pulled on her shorts-underwear, and then took her bra/undershirt off the fireplace _GET TO THE POINT_ corner it was hanging and began lacing it up.

She was half-way done when she heard the skittering noise, making her jerk her head up.

"Zackel?" Rielle said, looking around. She was still alone in the room. "Hey, Zack! This is a bad time for a prank!"

There was no answer. Grinding her teeth slightly, Rielle scooped up her axe and began heading for the door Zackel had gone through, slowly. For some reason, she suddenly had a very bad feeling.

The only noise now was the slight click of her hooves on the ground, as she made her way over to the door, axe at the ready. It had to be nothing. Probably just the castle settling. Or Zackel trying to screw with her after his most recent bout of servitude. Couldn't be anything else.

Just her and him, alone in this castle. All alone.

A shiver ran up her spine.

THUD.

Rielle jerked her axe up, even as she felt her pulse quicken.

THUD.

Something was coming.

THUD.

What could possibly be in here…

"Rielle? It's me." Zackel called. Rielle blinked, and then realized that the thuds were Zackel's staff on the stairs. He was letting her know he was coming back. "Are you decent?"

"…yeah. Come in." Rielle said, as Zackel emerged through the doorway, looking none the worse for wear.

"I went to check around the-whoa boy." Zackel said, whirling around. Rielle stared. "Uh Rielle…your shirt is slipping open."

"Wha?" Rielle said, looking down and realizing her half-done lacing had begun coming open from her recent jerking movements. She was glad Zackel had turned around, mostly because she didn't want him to see her blush as she began re-tying the clothing. Most of her chest, she could live with. Her flustered, not so much.

"Okay, okay. Done." Rielle said, after she'd fixed herself.

"Something happen?" Zackel said, turning around.

"Heard a weird noise myself. Decided to check it out."

"Really? Well I'm as lost as you. Went all over the castle. Nothing. Must just be the storm, or the building itself. Or our nerves, who knows."

"I want to." Rielle said, walking back over to the rest of her clothes. "We're doing another sweep."

Zackel watched Rielle walk for a few seconds: his official reason if given would have been the motion of her tail caught his eyes. Which was the truth. Mostly. The rest was adrenaline without a release, which Zackel rather wished would fade so his eyes wouldn't give his alien companion an excuse to beat him up more.

"…wait did you…" Rielle said, turning around as Zackel jerked his head up, the firelight catching her…

_Fire…_

_Laughing…_

"_BEG ME LITTLE BOY."_

"Gah!" Zackel said, blinking.

"Oh zoning out again. Grand timing, wizard. Come back down to the world here, we have another sweep to do." Rielle said, turning back to her clothing.

Zackel blinked a bit, before putting his face in his hand and grimacing. He was still having the flashbacks. It was starting to become more than irksome, especially considering that the woman who was triggering them…

Well, he wouldn't have minded a peek. Whether that just him being a red-blooded male, who could say.

Not like the other one.

The greatest regret. Even more so than Jasciona.

He really hoped they came under control soon. As far as he knew, he was sane. But considering what stirred in him every time he saw those images, and how they reflected in the draenei he at least considered a friend…

It had to end soon. Hopefully.

"As you wish." Zackel said, and waited for the Draenei to finish getting dressed.

* * *

"…what?" Rielle said flatly.

"You heard me. My turn." Zackel said. With the search of the castle having turned up nothing, Zackel had disposed of the bathwater, and while Rielle ate some bread, begun bringing in fresh snow and water. "You don't have to do anything. I made extra soap and all that myself. You just have to leave the room."

"Oh really." Rielle said, her eyes sparkling mischievously.

"Yes, REALLY." Zackel said, trying to denote deadly seriousness. Rielle settled her axe on the ground, and flashed Zackel a smile hardened killers would have trouble manifesting.

"MAKE ME, wizard boy."

* * *

SOME TIME LATER.

"Oh you dirty cheating bastard!" Rielle yelled at the massive ice blockage that now filled the door in front of her, the draenei now trapped out in the hallway the stairs were attached to. She had no idea how Zackel had talked her out of her axe, then put an ice trail on the floor to slide her out the door with a sneaky push before he'd sealed her out of the room with an ice wall. Or so she would claim. In truth, she'd thrown 'the match', more interested to see what Zackel would do to get rid of her instead of seriously planning to stay. However, he'd gotten the best of her just a bit more than she'd liked, and hence she was going to make sure he didn't have a quiet cleaning time.

"Yeah, yeah. Keep telling yourself that." Zackel said, standing in the tub as he rubbed soap into his hair. "Hmmmm. This _is _pleasant."

"Just you wait until I get back in there! I'm gonna dry you off by rotating you over the fire!"

"Would be quicker. It's always woman who take their time doing these things."

"OHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Rielle said. "Maybe I won't wait! Maybe I'll just kick this ice down right now!"

"Go ahead. You said it yourself. You'd go blind." Zackel said. "Or vomit. Or be so horrified you'd vomit out your eye sockets. Actually, that would be kind of interesting to see: do try and get in. I have nothing to hide."

"Why Zack, how very honest." Rielle snarked. Zackel paused for a second, then groaned to himself.

"Walked into that one."

* * *

"In all seriousness Zackel…" Rielle said some time later, when she was back in the room (without fulfilling any of the violent promises she'd made), the two adventurers now dry and sharing the evening meal. "Thanks."

"I do my best." Zackel said, taking a bite from a piece of fruit.

"I mean it. I bitch and complain and use you like slave labor, but while you got me stuck in here with you, you're talented enough to make it tolerable, and generous enough to make it almost like a camping trip. Jasciona must have been insane to leave you."

"Technically I left HER…though I'd rather not go back into that." Zackel said. "If we're going to tell stories again, I'd rather something lighter."

"Sure. There was this wizard who I took a bath in front of. He never peeked once. I think he was _light _in the _loafers_."

"That's not what I meant and you know it Rielle." Zackel said. "If you're going to just insult me all evening, again, let me pull out the Thrust board so I can get my own back."

* * *

Rielle learned quickly. REALLY quickly. While Zackel's mind had been nowhere near the game the last time (which probably had more to do with his loss than the draenei would have liked to admit), the warrior was picking up the strategy of the game to the point where Zackel considered lowering her handicap. In the end, he decided her gloating about her wins was less annoying than her gloating about scaring him would have been, and left it at that.

She'd long drifted off to sleep. Zackel was dozing himself when he heard it. He jerked his head up, looking around.

Nothing. Again. Zackel got up and skulked around the room anyway, and when he was done he made sure both doors leading into the makeshift barracks the two shared were firmly shut. After doing that, all without waking the draenei, he'd gone back to bed and managed to drift off to sleep.

* * *

_There were so many secrets in the world of Azeroth. So many sins. So many horrors._

_Who knew what sometimes lay, festering and forgotten, in some dark crack or abandoned corner…_

_Until someone opened it up?_

_Until someone let it out?_

_Are you alone…_

_Or do you only…_

_Think you are?

* * *

_

Zackel felt grouchy the next day. He hadn't slept well. Flitting nightmares he had been unable to remember.

It kept him from noticing that when he'd went to bed, his staff had been directly within reach.

When he'd woken up…that was no longer the case.

* * *

Author's note: No, she was shaving her LEGS you debauched hornd-WAIT A SECOND WHO WROTE _GET TO THE POINT _IN THE MIDDLE OF MY BLOODY CHAPTER?

Rielle: Evidentially someone who desired a point. How strange.


	12. Lines In The Sand

Chapter 12: Lines In The Sand

Arthas: With this accursed blade…I SHALL RULE AZEROTH!

Jaina: Come warriors! Time to hero up!

_DAH DAH DUH DAH DAH!_

_WHEN WINTER IS AT HAND_

_SCOURGE ALL ACROSS THE LAND_

_WHO__'__S GONNA HERO UP?_

_ON THE VERY EDGE OF FATE_

_WILL THEY ACTUALLY PULL THEIR WEIGHT?_

_WHO__'__S GONNA HERO UP?_

_WHO__'__LL SAVE THE DAY?_

_Wrynn: THE ALLIANCE!_

_Thrall: NO! THE HORDE!_

_WHO__'__LL ACTUALLY DO__…__SOME WORK?_

_SUPER (WOW) HERO SQUAD! (Hero up!)_

_SUPER (WOW) HERO SQUAD! (Hero up!)_

_GARROSH AND THRALL ARE FIERCE!_

_THE LICH KING ENDS UP IN TEARS!_

_WHEN JAINA JOINS THE FIGHT!_

_BRANN FLIES IN FROM THE SKY!_

_SAURFANG WILL CLEAVE YOUR HIDES!_

_FORDRING HAS THE POWER OF LIGGHHTTT!_

_WHO__'__LL SAVE THE DAY?_

_Rhonin: THE ALLIANCE!_

_Sylvanas: NO! THE HORDE!_

_THEY__'__LL NEVER GET__…__ALONG!_

_SUPER (WOW) HERO SQUAD! (Hero up!)_

_SUPER (WOW) HERO SQUAD! (Hero up!)_

_SUPER (WOW) HERO SQUAD! (Hero up!)_

_SUPER (WOW) HERO SQUAD!_

Vol'Jin: Hey mon…that was a TERRIBLE parody.

-------

With a jerk of surprise, Zackel woke up from his dream. Even as specific images began to fall away, he sat up, rubbing his eyes and trying to make sense of what remained.

"…I _really _think I need to stop eating food I'm conjuring out of nothing."

* * *

Zackel had no idea why Rielle was training in her underwear. The previous times he'd seen her run through her weapons practice, she'd been wearing her under-armor leathers, and sometimes pieces of the armor itself. Either she felt more comfortable doing it this way, and had waited to become more comfortable with Zackel before she did it, or it was a different phase of the training. Zackel didn't ask: he had a feeling the answer would bring him pain no matter what it was.

If she noticed his occasional glances at her as she trained, she didn't say anything. For his part, Zackel only glanced at her when some abrupt movement of hers caught his eye: his mind was mostly focused on another alchemic formula he was trying to work out. With the room sealed to prevent heat loss and the washroom cleaned, there did not seem to be any more immediate tasks (unless Rielle wanted another bath, which hopefully would NOT involve Zackel standing around blindfolded again), and hence Zackel had moved onto other matters. Like figuring out where they were going to get wood for their fire if they ran out (the former Orc chief's room had a decent amount, but no sense waiting until they were down to a few twigs before addressing that problem), and beyond that, other ways to pass the time.

Eventually though, Zackel hit a mental dead end, and found himself just watching Rielle, and her inhuman grace and power as she trained. If Zackel had known about such people, he would have likened her weapon drills as a combination of a Viking and a samurai: a Viking's power, ferociousness, and relentless drive, coupled with a samurai's fluidity, discipline, and constant, eternal refinement of their combat skills. The fact that she was an immensely attractive woman with a figure to die for (one Rielle worked herself half to death for on that, and was hence well-earned) certainly didn't hurt, but that fact mostly hung around the back of Zackel's mind…

"So, you getting your rocks off well enough, or should I dump a bucket of water over myself to drive it home?" Rielle said abruptly, facing away from Zackel when she spoke.

"Huh? Oh." Zackel replied. "You don't have a very high opinion of me half the time, do you?"

"You? Maybe more than half. Men? Nuh-uh." Rielle said, swinging around with her axe, continuing to train ferociously as she spoke. "Most of the time, you stick it in, yank it out, and then there's…"

"Rielle, Rielle, please! Too much information."

"Fine, no details. But for most of you I could have made do with a sword hilt."

"…wouldn't that be really cold and unpleasant?"

"I wouldn't know." Rielle said, a few locks of hair having come loose over her face again as she looked at Zackel. "My point stands. Most of you men aren't much of one. Now, you want to continue undressing me with your eyes?"

"Do you get extra exercise from jumping to conclusions? Yes, I was watching you. Not for that reason though, mostly. It's your technique. It's both fascinating and admirable. As for the small part that WAS for that reason…well, why wouldn't I? You're a work of art there too."

"Flattery will get you nowhere." Rielle said, sweeping her hand through her hair.

"Still, it's mostly your combat technique. Mostly…but how about this?" Zackel said, changing the subject. "I think I can help you with the training."

"Oh really."

"Yes." Zackel said, manifesting a snowball. "I'll throw these at you, and you have to dodge or block them."

"Your weak arm will toss balls of powder at me. I am sure this will help prodigiously." Rielle said with heavy sarcasm.

"Dismissing my efforts out of hand, yes, that's original. Actually, the snowball is because I figured, _MAYBE, _we should start small. Considering that there was a high chance you'd consider that a waste of time…" Zackel said, as the snowball hardened into a ball of ice. "There. Dense as any stone. As for my arm…"

The iceball lashed off Zackel's palm like someone had hit with a baseball bat, flying past Rielle and smashing against the wall, leaving a spider web of cracks on the stone.

"Not the relevant part." Zackel said. Rielle, despite this demonstration, gave a taunting chuckle and assumed a stance.

"Try me, little man. And don't cry when I knock one of those…"

Rielle jerked her weapon up, smashing the ice ball Zackel had summoned and projected while she was talking aside. Standing up himself, Zackel held up both hands, forming more weapons of frost. Rielle chuckled again and gestured for Zackel to bring it.

Zackel did, hurling ice at Rielle for nearly thirty minutes, the Draenei dodging, deflecting, or blocking nearly all the projectiles, with the only hits she took being glancing ones. Zackel had pressed on despite this fact (and the fact he wasn't aiming to hit her or hurt her, just help her training), having worked his way up to five projectiles being tossed in different patterns and timings at a time and been about to move up to six when Rielle held up a hand to stop.

"And once again…you manage to step…just above useless. Which is something, I guess." Rielle smirked, breathing clearly albeit deeply, more strands of wet hair down over her eyes and her body soaked with sweat and melted ice. "But I've had enough of your little tricks for today Zack. Get over here. Time for more combat training."

"Really? I was hoping I could just slam my head repeatedly on the floor instead. Same result, and quicker." Zackel said, even as he began stripping off his robe. Despite what he said, he was resigned to what was going to happen.

"Oh come on wizard. You just spent half an hour wearing me out, didn't you? This is a prime opportunity for you to have your way with me." Rielle said, putting her own weapon aside and stretching a bit.

"Same rules?"

"Yes. For your sake." Rielle said. "Maybe if you do good, I'll start teaching you practical, _real _combat. But that's if you do good. So no biting, no hair pulling, no cheap shots, and remember, don't touch these." Rielle said, indicating the tendrils behind her ears.

"What do those DO, anyway?" Zackel said, rotating his wrists.

"These? They help with hearing. Well, did. Sometimes. I…don't really remember all the details." Rielle said, brushing one of the lengths of flesh. "They used to be wholly filled with a soft liquid that aided in picking up vibrations and relaying them to the ears…but that was aeons ago. Eventually they came to be more tissue than liquid…sometimes. For some Draenei they help hearing a lot, some a little, and some they're just sort of there. Even if they don't have a proper use, though, they're sensitive. So I don't want you grabbing them unless you have a damn good reason."

"…an odd feature." Zackel commented.

"Oh you should talk. I've studied human bone structures as part of my warrior training. Do you know you have a residual tail in your rear end? If you're going to call my body into question, why don't you tell me what's THAT for?"

"Uh……um……." Zackel said. If he had known about the rumor passing around Northrend due to recent archeological discoveries about the Old Gods and the 'curse of flesh', he might have presented it as another example of the ancient beings' cruelty, giving humans a pointless bone that was just there to be broken. Lacking such knowledge, he was forced to literally grasp at straws (or in Zackel's case, the air, and with exaggerated comic motion to try and distract Rielle from gloating that she'd stumped him) for a bit before he shrugged his shoulders.

"Damn straight. At least these can-moving on." Rielle said, assuming a combat stance.

"What? They can what?"

"I said WE'RE MOVING ON. Now get over here so you can taste fur."

"I've had enough of that to last me a…" Zackel managed to get out before Rielle again demonstrated her ability to generate bursts of ridiculous speed to blur over to Zackel and toss him on the 'combat mat'. She immediately seized his arm and fell to the ground beside him, torquing it.

"Your arm is now useless." Rielle said, before giving his wrist a slight tweak. "Now your wrist's broken. If I'm feeling particularly angry or cruel, I can keep this up until I completely dislodge your arm from your body."

"Ow." Zackel whimpered.

"Here's how you get out of it wizard…"

* * *

If asked, Zackel wouldn't have said that he 'enjoyed' Rielle's combat lessons. Some people might have expected him to say it was great, rolling around with a half-naked woman (well, alien, but woman enough). Zackel would have pointed out that the whole process was pretty much all take, no give: Rielle was utterly merciless in her teaching and refused to hand Zackel an inch. Being a mage, and doing all his body work via intense meditation and energy flow (which, while it kept him slim and in shape, did nothing to develop strength in his muscles or flexibility in his joints), he was hard pressed to put up anything resembling a proper resistance. Maybe that was the whole point of her lessons slash practice, but Zackel had also noticed that, while she had not repeated her 'beg me' maneuver, it was clear that she still, sometimes anyway, enjoyed the compromising positions she repeatedly got him in a touch too much, tweaking his nose, sticking her tongue out at him as he tried to get his arms free, and getting him so turned around and dizzy he sometimes lost which way was up.

But, she WAS teaching him, instead of pretending to do so in a way that let her beat him to a pulp. That, Zackel could tell. It was hellish, but he was starting to pick things up. Maybe he'd have to sacrifice his ego to pick up more, but Zackel could live with that.

It probably helped that, despite the cocky airs he put on, he didn't have much of an ego since…

_Heat…_

_Blood…_

_Laughing, such joyous, cruel laughing…_

Zackel slipped out of Rielle's grip, and much to her (and his) surprise he actually managed to get around her and hold onto her arm to pull it into a restraining grip. When Rielle tried to elbow him, he shifted his weight to get out of its range, keeping Rielle's arm locked behind her.

"……..Well, wizard. Maybe you actually ARE learning something." Rielle said, turning her head around to face Zackel. Disquietly, she looked happy. Her glowing eyes sometimes made her hard to read: Zackel couldn't tell exactly WHY she looked happy, hence the disquiet.

"Now I can actually start trying."

In two seconds, so quick Zackel had no idea what she'd done, she was out of his grip.

The next three minutes were probably the worst pseudo-beating Zackel had ever taken in his life.

"Got anything else, wizard boy? Any more tricks?" Rielle said when she was done, nudging Zackel with her finger as he lay on his side. Zackel's response was a lamenting gurgle. "Come on. I'm waiting. I like interesting fights. More satisfying to…"

Zackel surged up and tried to tackle Rielle to the ground. The draenei may have been a little surprised, but it wasn't enough to help Zackel, as she seized him up before he could get anything resembling an advantage, flashed him a smile that would have done wolves proud, and hurled him over her.

And found she'd mis-calculated where the furs were, causing Zackel to do a rough face plant into the hard stone floor.

"AH! ZACKEL!" Rielle said, crawling over to the mage's limp form. "Zackel? Oh shit, oh shit…"

"Uggghh-awrgh." Zackel moaned, pushing himself up as blood fountained from his nose. "Ugh, too much…ahhhh…"

"Oh man…" Rielle said, looking around for something to put on Zackel's face. She growled in frustrating as she found precisely nothing that worked, and returned to Zackel as he knelt on the ground, holding his nose. "Hold still…let me…"

"I think…"

"Come on…let me…" Rielle said, shifting Zackel's hand away as she carefully and gently took his face in her hand. "Okay, tilt your head back…just a bit…"

"Ow." Zackel said, as Rielle felt around Zackel's features with a feather-light touch.

"I don't think you broke anything. Just mashed your nose…" Rielle said, closing said nose between two fingers to allow the blood to clot. "I'm sorry Zackel. I didn't mean to do that."

"Ugh…"

"It'll be all right…just let me check…some more…" Rielle said, feeling around Zackel's face a bit with her other hand. "No, definitely no broken bones. How's your teeth?"

"Huh?"

"Did you lose or break any teeth?"

"Mmmm-mmm."

"Okay good…we're lucky then…okay…" Rielle said. "I'm sorry Zackel. I…I'm sorry, just…"

"Mmmmm. I…understand…" Zackel managed to mumble. "Just…_glad_…you are."

"Hey." Rielle said, sounding mildly (albeit genuinely) offended. "I'm bad to the bone and all, but I'm not a monster."

"…right…never thought…you were." Zackel said.

The images that flittered across his eyes, not full-on recollections but brief glances at the old horror, made him feel as bad that he was lying to himself, and by extension Rielle, as his nose did.

* * *

Of course, once it was clear Zackel's close call had just gotten him a bloody nose, Rielle's sympathetic attitude had dried up and she'd begun needling him again with her usual witticisms. Zackel could almost swear she was as happy at the fact that she could keep tossing semi-insults his way as the fact he wasn't severely hurt.

Zackel had gotten his revenge though, when he'd pulled out the Thrust board for their now nightly after-dinner game and announced that her handicap had been cut to 10 points. After the nose incident, Rielle had no solid ground to lodge a protest, and proceeded to play with a reduced chance to win and Zackel pulling no punches of his own. Which resulted in several crushing victories for him in a row.

"And of people, the one to step in was Lady KATRANA PRESTOR." Zackel said, in the middle of a story as he laid a stone down. Rielle almost immediately put a stone down herself…right where Zackel had thought she would. He slammed another stone down in turn, and Rielle stared at the board and realized she'd been out-maneuvered again. With a fake cry of rage, she mimed picking up the game board and beating Zackel over the head with it. Zackel just sat there, one hand against his cheek, seemingly unfazed at the faux-retaliation.

"You SUCK." Rielle snapped.

"No no, Rielle, you keep reversing the term. The correct term is I RULE. I DOMINATE. I OVERSHADOW. I-Gack!" Zackel yelped as Rielle flicked him on the forehead.

"Talk too much." Rielle said, as she began clearing up her stones. "Do it in a way that's interesting. Continue the story."

"Right. Now, we all know who Lady Prestor really was. I don't know WHY Onyxia got involved. Maybe she was trying to shore up a plan of hers, or maybe she was just bored. While everyone thought it was pretty strange that she'd be replacing the prosecutor in the middle of a trial, she had so much power at the time no one could do anything about it. She knew that too…however, I think she focused a bit too much on the power she had and the supposed intimidation that usually came with it. So the day begins and she restarts the cross-examination…"

"_So, doctor, before you began to perform the dissection for causes of death, did you check to see if the victim's heart still beat?" Prestor/Onyxia said._

"_No."_

"_Did you see if breath still flowed through his lungs, or blood thrummed in his veins?"_

"_No."_

"_And why did you NOT do this, doctor? How do you not know the victim was alive when you began your work?"_

"_Because his brain was sitting in a jar on the desk."_

"I'm not sure if at this point Onyxia was just too into her chosen tactic of 'hammer away to try and produce doubt' or if she simply was winging it as she went along, because the next thing she said, possibly before her mind could catch up…"

"_But the patient could have still been alive!"_

_The courtroom fell silent, as Prestor/Onyxia realized just what she had proposed. Unfortunately, said realization was not fast enough to cut off the doctor's answer._

"_I suppose he could have still been alive and part of the nobility somewhere."_

"…ha! Oh light, ha ha ha…!" Rielle snorted. "That doctor's lucky she didn't return to her true form and eat him right then and there!"

"Well, the story IS somewhat apocryphal…"

"A-what now?"

"Oh, sorry. Its truth is somewhat questionable. Might be partly made up, or two stories mashed into one. You know."

"Yeesh. You mages. I'm not exactly a kobold when it comes to speaking Common, but leave it to you wizards to keep making up new words."

"It's what we're good at."

"Besides being squishy."

"Yes, yes." Zackel said. "Whether the story is true or not, who can say. If it is, the doctor is probably lucky King Wrynn came back when he did. He might…anyway." Zackel said, placing a stone down.

"He might what?"

"Nothing, nothing."

"Now I'm curious. Finish the sentence, Zack. Or I'll finish _you."_ Rielle said, gesturing menacingly.

"…what?"

"Huh?"

"Finish me? Finish me how? That sentence makes no sense."

"Uh…oh fel. Well it's not like every witticism-see I can use big words too!-that comes out of your mouth is a winner either. Finish what you were going to say."

"…are you SURE?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"…If I recall correctly, you might not like it."

"Try me."

"…okay. Fine." Zackel said. "That doctor might be the only lucky one in regards to King Wrynn coming back. The rest of us…who can really say."

"…heh." Rielle said, rubbing a finger beneath her nose. "Speaking mockery against your king? That's treason, is it not?"

"If Wrynn has made it treason to express what one believes, then he fully deserves my judgment. And that is simply this: he is an idiot. A complete and utter idiot."

Rielle's face became a bit clearer, a general expression of dislike settling on her features. Zackel had anticipated that, and began speaking again before she could.

"But maybe I have no right to judge. I wasn't at the Wrathgate." Zackel said. "And from what I have managed to gather, you were."

"…Yes. On the rear lines. There were so many eager, strong warriors there that we had to draw lots for who got the primary positions. I suffered poor luck, that didn't turn out to be so poor." Rielle said, swallowing. "…I still hear them screaming, as that thrice-damned plague devoured them. The stench was…something I doubt I'll ever experience again. And I don't want to. I don't…" Rielle said, before her complexion went pallid and she held up a hand to her mouth.

"Rielle…"

"I'm all right. I WAS fortunate. I lived. Lived to see the Horde prove themselves to be new talk, and same old action. The battles at Wintergrasp, after that, proved it. The Horde cannot be trusted, and it would be far better for this world if they were quelled. "

"…maybe."

"MAYBE?" Rielle said, looking up, her eyes angry and intense. "Have you actually seen the Horde when they're being themselves, wizard? You think the fact they fight the Scourge as well means anything? IT DOESN'T!"

"We…"

"The orcs can claim finding their true heritage all they want! It hasn't changed how bloodthirsty, and how vicious, those orcs always seem to be at their core! And their allies…trolls are maybe even worse! I don't care if they're a renegade offshoot of WHATEVER, they're still trolls! You ever see what happens when a troll wants to prove a point? I could tell you stories that would make your skin crawl so much it would rip right off your body! And even if we could denote what the Forsaken did at the Wrathgate, they're the _living dead!_ You can't be brought to such a state, and remain the same, and their inability to really accept that and stop blaming the living for being alive doesn't make them tragic, it makes them stupid, dangerous THINGS! The only ones who really mystify me are the Tauren, but I've never seen a Tauren give me any quarter in any encounter I've had with them! And the Blood Elves, oh the Blood Elves, forgetting the Highborne, forgetting Shattrath, forgetting Kael'thas and any and all _SETBACKS_ he might have had, fel, forgetting their addiction to magic WHICH WAS THEIR OWN DAMN FAULT, and the ATROCITY they committed to STEAL the light of paladins for their own benefit, that thing that gets me, _REALLY_ gets me, about the Blood Elves is their unfathomable CONCEIT. It's bad enough that they're so in love with themselves that I'm amazed they have relationships and don't just kiss mirrors, but they seem completely incapable of caring about anything, ANYTHING AT ALL, besides themselves. I once backed up a spy on a Horde camp, and part of what we saw were the wounded being tended. Orcs, trolls, fel, even FORSAKEN were looking after the injured. Not a blood elf in sight. Oh, save one little pocket nearby, watching the efforts of the doctors. I wasn't close enough to be sure, but from their body language, I'd lay even money that they were placing bets on who would live and die. Me on my worst, cruelest day can't even come close to the cold, disgusting arrogance that seems to hold sway over everything so many blood elves are. That's the Horde, Zackel. That's what Wrynn, the so-called IDIOT, wants to wipe out. I don't care how wise, how powerful, how damn blessed Thrall is, and from what I've heard he's one hell of an exception to the rules. But he's out-numbered a hundred to one by creatures that couldn't hold a candle to him. Eventually, they will win out. And Wrynn will be proven right."

Rielle fell silent, and with an angry snap laid a Thrust stone down. Zackel looked at the move, and then began twirling one of the stones in his fingers.

"You're not all wrong though." Rielle said. "I…really can't stand the Horde…"

"Understandable." Zackel said quietly.

"But…only one side will win a Fourth War. I may not be as wide in my tarring as Wrynn is, but I don't disagree with his mindset…save for the fact that he seems incapable of grasping _that fact. _The fact that he seemingly can't…it keeps me from throwing my support completely behind him. I wouldn't call him an _idiot, _but…" Rielle said, helplessly gesturing at the air.

"He's not without strong reasons." Zackel said. "I can only imagine his life. Centuries of peace in the Eastern Kingdoms overall, no indication of what was to come…and then the Dark Portal opens, and the corrupted Orcs come storming through, burning and destroying, murdering his father in front of him, driving humans across the continent with the strong possibility the Orcs would sweep them right into the sea…I was born during the time when the counter-attack began, and the Alliance won the day in the end, but I've heard many stories from survivors that they truly, completely thought it was the end of the world. After enduring all that, I'm sure Wrynn thought they'd stepped back from the brink, and that nothing could ever grow that bad again. Then to be proven wrong as he was, with the fractures between countries, and Onyxia's manipulations causing the death of Wrynn's wife, and then the Third War with the Scourge, who turned Arthas, who Wrynn considered a great friend, into what he became…I can see why Varian would hold a great deal of anger and hatred in his heart. And then his disappearance due to the Defias, losing his memory during their attempt to abduct him or his escape from them, I've heard conflicting accounts, getting enslaved by orcs as a gladiator, and then after a long journey of re-discovering who he was and all that had befallen him, having to fight his way back to his throne and save his kingdom all over again before Onyxia took over. And that's leaving out all the variations of the story I've heard, like someone made an evil twin of him, or Onyxia raped him in human form and conceived some sort of human/dragon THING who called him father when Varian killed him, or…well, there's been a lot of accounts about what exactly happened during his return and Onyxia's unmasking and death, who can say what really occurred. Such events would greatly change a normal man, let alone what King Wrynn had already endured before all that. And then the Wrathgate, and what befell Fordragon there due to the Forsaken's betrayal…it would take a saint not to react to it all, and Wrynn is no saint. After all that, I can see perfectly well why he'd seize onto the idea that the Horde must be wiped off the face of Azeroth."

Zackel paused, before he looked at his Thrust stone and dropped it in his makeshift container, plucking another out.

"But…" Zackel said. "Have you ever seen a grid-plate, Rielle? It's a gnome invention, a self-heating lattice of metal powered by some gnome trickery I have yet to understand, and considering I study the field…well, self-heating when they work, which isn't often…but I heard a gnome say something once. He lamented that a cat accidentally sat on a hot grid-plate of his, and I asked him if that was not a good thing: would the cat no longer sit on a hot grid-plate now? Yes, the gnome said, but the cat would also never sit on a cold one either. And it struck me how true the lament was, and what it means. You need to only take the knowledge out of a situation that applies to it, and stop there. The fact that many don't is a human failing. But our innate flaws only take us so far. Wrynn should remember it was Onyxia who was behind all that later suffering, not the Horde. He should remember the Horde members who aided him getting home, because I'm sure there are a few. And while his initial assessment after the Wrathgate that all the Horde had turned against him may have been acceptable, the fact that it was a _renegade faction _of the Forsaken who committed that atrocity, who were promptly exterminated partly by the _HORDE THEMSELVES, _and that this knowledge has become so far-known that _I_ know it, and yet the fact that Wrynn persists in his saber-rattling towards them…well, maybe calling him a complete idiot is too harsh. But he's not heading in a direction that seems likely to make me change my opinion. And this time, he doesn't have a Horde invasion, or dragon manipulation, or sects of genocidal alchemists to lay blame for the failings in his assessment. He just has his own self. And the king I knew, as obliquely as I may have, is better, and needs to be, than that."

"…right then. You done, or do you want to keep using up air in this room until we pass out?" Rielle said, oddly mirroring Zackel's earlier pose of leaning her face on one hand, though her tone was not dismissive of Zackel's argument. Rather, she was calling him on how overblown it had become.

"Sorry. But after you busted out your own panegyric, the mage in me felt that it had to be, at the least, matched."

"My what now?"

"…speech."

Rielle dealt out another forehead flick. Zackel took it with his usual resigned expression.

"Look, you're right. Maybe I haven't really interacted much with the Horde…" Zackel said.

"You haven't."

"But as you yourself has said. Thrall's quite a leader. And every bad thing that happened to Wrynn, Thrall can match, or maybe even surpass. Wrynn got to be a slave for what, a year at most? Thrall was born as a slave, his NAME means slave, and the man who raised him, Blackmoore? He was as cruel and as terrible as any of the Horde members you encountered, and he didn't have the excuse of demonic corruption, magic addiction, or being raised from the dead. Oh yes, there may have been issues about his father being a traitor, and how that affected others' opinions of him, and how he got a raw deal because of it and how that effected _HIM_ in turn, but compared to the issues I just brought up, it's like comparing a flower to a tree. They might both be plants, but they're not the same. Yet, is Thrall the one chomping at the bit to start a new war? No. Maybe Thrall, as you said, is just blessed with a saint-like deposition, but as you _also_ said, he has to deal with the fact that so many of the creatures he gathered together as the Horde do NOT. Yet when Daelin Proudmoore-wow, Thrall has trouble with people with Moore in their name- came sailing in to Kalimdor and tried to kill his new society, did he declare that all humans would never change and that they needed to be wiped out? When the Dark Portal opened up again, did he declare that it was human warlocks that brought the Legion back and that he would ensure the failings of his species would not be repeated through the failings of others? When Wrynn confronted him, did he jump on the chance to start a fight and be fully justified in defending himself and by extent his people, or did he react purely defensively? And did he not do all that despite all the creatures around him who probably wanted him to? You're right, maybe Thrall is fighting against a tide that will eventually drown him, but the fact that someone like him is in charge of the Horde…"

"Passing ouuutttt…"Rielle fake-groaned, clutching her throat.

"Okay, I'll sum up Rielle. The greatest tragedy here is, in the biggest issues, neither side is wrong. I don't expect us to all join hands and dance in the fields, but you yourself saw it in that Horde camp, tending their wounded. Evil, and weakness, is not a trait inherent to race, not even for something like the Forsaken. But the tragedies of the past and the failures inherent in our nature is only going to hold up as an excuse over our constant scuffles and the flames of war so much. We have to come together over our similar traits, not go drawing more lines in the sand just because we can! Our TRUE enemy, the Scourge, has no such variables. Those within the middle that were going to break away already have. All that remains are the rank and file undead who may as well be machines made of meat, and their elite accursed rulers whose bodies and souls are so corrupted with evil that you could probably breed a whole new generation of poisons out of their blood. THEY'RE the enemy. Them, and the Legion behind them, who made them, who corrupted the orcs in the first place, trigger events of that notwithstanding, not to mention anything ELSE that's lurking in the dark wanting to kill us all…damn it Rielle, why do I call Wrynn an idiot? Because he's utterly obsessed with history without LEARNING ANYTHING FROM IT!"

"…History." Rielle said, assuming a very solemn tone. "A record of things left behind by past generations, started in…let's say 475. Thus we should try to view historical times as the behind of the present, for this gives incite into the _anals _of the past. From the secondary sources we are given hindsight into the future. Hindsight, after all, is caused by lack of foresight."

"…you know, if you hadn't made that terrible pun with anal, I honestly wouldn't be sure if you were attempting your own musing or making fun of me."

"This is what happens from you wizards reading so many books. You get dust on the brain, and sneeze it on us." Rielle said. "You're a smart guy Zackel. But you're not smart enough to realize that I'm not saying you're wrong in your assessment. And that you're not going to change my mind about the Horde. I'm not going to swing my axe into every orc or whatever face that crosses my sight…but I have yet to be given a reason that that's not how it's going to end. I know of past tragedies too. My people were the first victim of the orcs, after all."

Silence filled the room.

"What's that?" Rielle spoke up.

"…huh?" Zackel said.

"You look like you were going to say something."

"What? Oh…no. No, I'm done." Zackel said, as he summoned every bit of guile he possessed and lied directly to Rielle's face. He _had _almost said something, and stopped himself, a subtle motion Rielle had detected. However, she either wasn't paying attention to his follow-up motion, or she believed what he said without question. And hence Zackel got away with it.

"Well, finally." Rielle said, laying another Thrust stone down. Within him, a small voice spoke up in Zackel, raising the cruelly barbed point of what it said about him that he was building a friendship on secrets. Zackel ordered the voice to shut up and shoved it down into a corner of his mind. He'd never claimed to be a saint either. "Remind me never to ask you mages what you think again. Stick to writing bad poetry, Zack."

"For your information, I happened to be pretty good at poetry. On the spot poetry at that, too."

"Oh really, what part of mage training is that?"

"Thaumaturgic Locution Correlation."

"…you just made that up."

"Nope. It's about linking what you want magic to do with words and gestures. Including stream of consciousness creativity."

"Oh really. Prove it, mage."

"Pick your rhyme."

"Rhyme?"

"Rhyme it is." Zackel said, as he drank from his canteen.

"Wait, what?"

"You just asked for a poem where the rhyme is, well, the word rhyme, as far as I can tell. How many lines do you want?" Zackel said.

"I don't care, forty-seven!" Rielle said. "Yeah, Mr. Clever, let's see…"

"_A panto-writer, Harry Hyam,  
Who was extremely fond of rhyme,  
Said one day to his comrades: "I'm  
Just sick of writing pantomime  
For which I get paid half a dime…"_

("What's a dime?"

"It's a term used in places for a silver piece, I don't know why. So half a dime is five coppers."

"Are you going to have to explain half the…?")

"_I'm going to write a poem sublime,  
By which you'll see my fame will climb  
Above all others, for this time  
I'm only going to use ONE rhyme!"  
His friends said he was past his prime  
And even working overtime,  
They said, he'd never keep ONE rhyme  
Right through a poem. But Harry Hyam  
Had started off and by noontime  
He'd written fifteen lines of rhymes  
Each one the same, and by bed-time  
He'd written more and more betime.  
But listen! Isn't it a crime?  
It happened that a small enzyme…"_

("What?"

"A complex organic substance that causes chemical transformations of material in plants and animals."

"How am I supposed to…?")

_"That looked just like a speck of lime  
Had landed on his head some time,  
And as he heard the midnight chime  
This enzyme started making slime  
That smelt of matters maritime,  
And oozed out through his fingers' grime  
And landed on his paper. I'm__  
Quite sure I don't have to mime  
What happened next, but, by bedtime,  
The slime and grime had caused a zyme…"_

("Now you're just making words up to cover your ass."

"Zyme: The substance causing a zymotic infectious disease, _zymotic_ being a general epithet for infectious disease for those familiar with its more complicated details, originally because it was regarded as being caused by a process analogous to fermentation."

"…HUH?"

"Moving on!")

"_Which wholly covered Harry Hyam,  
And, as he lived in Hildesheim  
Which has a hot and sultry clime  
(Especially in the summertime),  
This zyme converted into…chyme!"_

("The semi-fluid pulpy acid matter into which food is converted in the stomach by the action of the gastric secretion!"

"…that's what I was going to guess.")

"_And soon digested Harry Hyam  
From slimy feet…to slimy cyme!"_

("Okay wait a second…"

"Cyme: A head! From Old Dwarfish _cyme_ or _cime_ meaning "top, summit."

"Did you used to sleep at night or did you just cram books into your head endlessly instead and suffice entirely on your overtaxed brain not realizing it needed to rest?")

_"His hands, his hair, his pen, his rhyme.  
And all it left was the half a dime  
They'd paid him for the pantomime  
They put on once, in Burgwindheim.  
His friends came round at breakfast time,  
And sighed to find this paradigm  
Of poets gone. The half a dime  
They took and tied it up in sime…"_

("Sime: A rope or cord. A northern dialect word last recorded being used in Lordaeron 110 years before the First War." Zackel rushed out.

"What, _twine_ wasn't good enough?" Rielle said.

"…D'OH!"

"And I believe that's three short, mage." Rielle said, smirking.

"Who said I was done?")

_"And buried it in Gundelsheim.  
And on the grave they planted………thyme,  
- For that's all there was left to rhyme."_

Rielle stared at her erstwhile companion. Zackel held her gaze, even as he put a Thrust stone down.

"Your move?"

Rielle's eyes fell on the board…and realized that she'd been out-maneuvered. Again.

"…I hate you." Rielle said, and flicked Zackel in the forehead again.

* * *

_**Why don't you give her a real reason to hate you, mage?**_

_**Why don't you tell her what you swallowed and lied to her about? That it was her people who fell to Sargaras long before the Orcs did, and that no draenei has any right to condemn any member of the Horde with a legacy like that? And why you know that fact so well?**_

_**Fel, since she has such a strong opinion of the Horde, why don't you tell her the full truth of why you didn't have any Runes of Portals?**_

_**Or better yet, why don't you tell her that two nights ago, you had a recollection of your pathetic true self so strong you knelt by her sleeping side for ten minutes and wondered a few times if you should just stab her?**_

_**What does it say, of all you've seen and assessed about her, that you keep drawing links between her and the other one? That you keep wanting something, anything, to avenge your total failure, no matter how insanely tenuous?**_

_**You're pathetic. Jasciona saw it. Rielle will too. Worthless, hypocritical vermin…**_

Zackel's eyes popped open as the dark words faded away. He wasn't sure if the soul-wrenching condemnation had been a nightmare, his doubts given full reign in the strange realm between dreams and reality…or something else altogether.

He hadn't forgotten the strange noises he'd heard the previous days, after all.

The memories were fresh enough that he got up and checked both door before he went back to sleep.

* * *

_"Gar'mak." Thrall said, as he watched the chaos before him. "First old demons from our past, then that lord of the dead in Northrend, and now…giant enemy crabs!"_

"_WWWWWAAA'RCK!" Orc guards yelled as they flew past Thrall, knocked through the air by the giant enemy crab…which was pretty much what was said on the tin. It was a crab, it was giant (the size of a house to be specific) and it was certainly treating all the Horde outside Orgrimmar as an enemy._

"_Do something Thrall! A REAL Warchief would!" Garrosh yelled from behind the large rock he was crouched behind._

"_Yes, doesn't that mean you need to come out and solve the problem boy?"_

"_I have a stomach cramp!"_

"_Dis is a big problem mon. I hope you have a big solution." Vol'jin said, looking at the destruction the giant enemy crab was causing._

"_I do. Cairne?"_

_The Tauren chief slammed down his foot, the impact rippling out and erupting beneath the giant enemy crab._

"_What's the plan then mon?" Vol'jin asked, as the giant enemy crab was flipped onto its back._

"_I shall defeat this foe with the power…__**OF ROCK."**_

_With a mighty leap, Thrall jumped up onto the crab's vulnerable underside, manifesting several totems…_

_And then he split the Doomhammer in two and began playing them like drums._

_**DUN-DUN-DUN-DUNDUNDUN-DUNDUN…!**_

"………_I seen a lot of screwed up things in my time, but dis take the screwed up cookie." Vol'jin said with dull surprise, as Thrall's rhymic pounding on the writhing crab echoed through the valley. One of the crab's claws tried to snatch Thrall, only for Thrall to bat it away and continue pounding on his idol-drums._

"_Ha! You call that rocking out, Thrall?" Garrosh yelled, appearing and pinning the claw to the ground with a giant axe…which was also a giant electric guitar. "THIS IS HOW A WARCHIEF ROCKS OUT!"_

_Garrosh began firing off his own instrumental in tune with Thrall's. Sylvanas appeared, stared for a second, then shrugged her shoulders and began firing at the crab with her crossbow._

"_Well now, you wanna make me think I'm going crazy any more?" Vol'jin asked Cairne. Cairne proceeded to pull out a trumpet and begin blowing on it, adding to the music and assaulting the crab with sonic shockwaves. "Thank you. Me gonna go with the flow now."_

_Vol'jin split his blade in two, drew a circle of energy in the air, and began slamming the blades against the circle in time with the music, sending pulses of destructive energy smashing into the increasingly-beleaguered crab._

_And then for some reason Varian Wrynn and Jaina showed up. Why? What, you were expecting sense to return?_

"_NO HORDE WILL ROCK HARDER THAN I CAN! COME JAINA!" Varian yelled, producing his own electric guitar and charging in._

"_I hate my life…" Jaina said, as she also produced a bass guitar and followed Varian, on foot and in tune as he also began playing._

_And so all the people and creatures fortunate to be in the area saw a once in a lifetime sight as seven heroes of the world proceeded to make some noise all over a giant enemy crab, a symphony of power that ended when Thrall roared and slammed the Doomhammer down on the crab with one last thunderous beat._

_The giant enemy crab exploded into millions of tiny pieces. Considering how hard Thrall had hit, it was amazing it didn't fly apart into its component atoms, as he jumped down and his allies posed around him._

"_FOR THE HORDE!" Thrall bellowed._

"_Jaina, get back here!" Varian yelled at the sorceress, as she was posing with the Horde._

"_No. Maybe people will actually think I'm cool now."_

_**IN NORTHREND.**_

"_I planned to drive my foes out of their minds with fear…" The Lich King grumbled. "I did not expect THIS kind of lunacy."_

"_Hey Dracula." Werewolf said._

"_FOR THE LAST TIME I'M NOT DRACULA!"_

_-------  
_

"Guhhhhhhh!" Zackel yelped, jerking awake again. "…okay, I _DEFINITELY _need to stop eating food I'm conjuring out of nothing."


	13. A Faint Cold Fear

Chapter 13: A Faint Cold Fear

Writer's Note: If you'd like to ask questions about my story, head over to my forum connected to my profile. Just keep in mind I have no obligation to give you an answer. Or not lie. Or tell the truth in the guise of a lie.

Hey, that's storytelling.

* * *

"_But evil things, in robes of sorrow,  
Assailed the monarch's high estate.  
(Ah, let us mourn!__—__for never morrow  
Shall dawn upon him desolate!)  
And round about his home the glory  
That blushed and bloomed,  
Is but a dim-remembered story  
Of the old time entombed. _

_And travelers, now, within that valley,  
Through the red-litten windows see  
Vast forms, that move fantastically  
To a discordant melody,  
While, like a ghastly rapid river,  
Through the pale door  
A hideous throng rush out forever  
And laugh__—__but smile no more.__"_

-Edgar Allen Poe

The whispers may have been the fading echo of dreams, or maybe not. But there was one definite noise that dwelled in reality, a noise that dragged Zackel Wintersoul out of a restless sleep. He had his staff in his hand a second before his mind fully clarified that he had reached for it, aiming it out among the dancing shadows within his 'living quarters'. Air rasped loudly through his nostrils as he moved the staff around, seeking movement to go with the sound.

None came. Not even another sound, save Zackel's own breath.

"What is it?" Rielle said. Zackel glanced over at the Draenei warrior, who had woken up, retrieved her axe, and gotten into a crouched ready position without Zackel having any indication she'd moved.

"Don't know. Heard something."

"Something?"

"Yes." Zackel said, getting to his feet and reaching for his slightly tattered but still mostly good robe.

"You sure it wasn't just a nightmare? You've been groaning in your sleep a lot these past few nights."

"No. Not just a nightmare."

"How sure are you?"

"Deathly sure." Zackel said, now clad in his robes.

"I'll get dressed." Rielle said, standing fully upright herself before heading for her leathers and armor.

"You do that. I'm going to go check something."

"If there's a problem, we shouldn't split up."

"Not going down into the lower floors. Going to check the stairways to the roof."

"The stairways? You mean the ones leading to the _outside _roof, where a storm that could freeze the feathers off any flying beast has been howling for nearly two weeks now? The storm YOU caused, I might remind you?" Rielle said, trying to lighten the tense mood.

"Duly reminded. And yes. Those stairways. Never assume anything in this world, no matter how obvious." Zackel said, as he headed out the right hand door of their sleeping quarters. There were two stairways leading to the roof, but the one that was closer to the downward stairs of the citadel actually had a door that worked: Zackel had sealed it shut. The other one was too badly damaged, and Zackel had been forced to seal the doorway that lead out of their quarters and to the staircase and roof instead of the roof-bound one. Said route was the one Zackel used to access the roof to check on his storm, and where he had had to do all the shoveling Rielle had made him do in the first several days.

"Should I put my back to the wall?" Rielle called after him, half serious and half needling.

"If you think that will help." Zackel replied, his words drifting, ghost-like, through the door. Rielle lightly chewed on her upper lip, and then sped up her dressing efforts. Maybe it WAS nothing, but Zackel's reaction had gone past the point where he should have chalked it up to some random noise of the fortress, or simple paranoia. When someone took on that tone, it was best to listen to them until evidence presented a reason to the contrary.

The silence in the fortress took on an oppressive quality when one became acutely aware of it, Rielle noticed as she dressed. She dumped some more logs on the fire to increase the light and background noise, but that didn't ease the nerves she herself had started to develop. She was just about ready to head up after Zackel when she heard him returning.

"Nothing." Zackel said, entering the room. "Door's still open, but no evidence of any presence besides ours. Footprints and the like."

"How could you tell? The way the wind is blowing the snow around out there, any trace should be wiped out in minutes, if that." Rielle said.

"To the naked eye, yes. To a frost mage? Not so much." Zackel said, as he closed the door to the stairway and locked it. "I can, with some effort, search for discrepancies in the calefaction matrixes…"

"You're cooking what for dinner?" Rielle said, snapping her face-plate on. Zackel gave the warrior a mild glare, and could have sworn she was sticking her tongue out behind her metal mask.

"I can search for the ghost of footprints, via very small traces of lingering heat. Didn't find any. Didn't find any traces of any kind, really." Zackel said. "If anything is in here, it didn't come in through the roof."

"So what, it came through the front door? Without either of us noticing?"

"Not just that. It would have to come through the front door, without either of us noticing, and not trigger any of my traps. Ever." Zackel said. "And this is not the first time I think I heard something, if you recall. So, what could pass through, and by anything, without leaving any sign?"

"…so…what? We're dealing with a ghost?"

"Perhaps. But that would raise another question." Zackel said, as he located one of their torches and held it in the fire. "What's a ghost doing out here? In HERE?"

Rielle's initial response was simple: she hoisted her axe.

"Let's go ask." Rielle said. "And if it doesn't turn out to be a ghost, let's firmly express our disappointment at their normalcy and their intrusion."

* * *

Strangely, what occupied Zackel's thoughts as they headed down the stairs was not whatever he had sensed, but how odd it was to see Rielle back in her full armor again. It wasn't a question of whether she'd be better off partially armored: Zackel knew her well enough to know that the alien being dressed in all of the heavy metal wouldn't slow her down at all. It was whether that truth would prove to be a factor that briefly occupied the mage's thoughts. It was good armor, yes…but Zackel had seen more than one cocky idiot cut down to size (one time, literally) because they thought their armor could deal with anything an enemy could throw at them. Then again, Rielle had clearly demonstrated that she did not think that way. At least, according to her stories. And when she was filled with seething murderous rage that needed something to be released onto.

She would hopefully be even better calm and alert. Right?

Considering the nature of the threat (that is, he was completely unaware of anything about it, or if it even existed), Zackel could only hope that was the case.

"Well now Zack…" Rielle said, as they reached the bottom of the stairs. "If I was an uninvited guest who wanted to stay out of sight, where might I go?"

"Well, ideally I'd want to stay in a room my co-tenants didn't even know about, but considering we've explored this place pretty well and we can't exactly go wandering around bashing down every wall to possibly find a secret room…" Zackel said, before he trailed off at Rielle's glare. "Basement."

"Just for that, you're going down alone."

"Is that wise? I'm squishy."

"Yes, and I'll use that to send you down the stairs with my foot imprinted on your ass if you don't haul it." Rielle said. Zackel muttered to himself and turned to the closed and locked basement door, said basement being the only room that Zackel and Rielle avoided because of the fact they'd turned it into a makeshift graveyard.

"You know, if I die, it's going to be very boring for you all alone here."

"Nah, I'll just babble nonsense sometimes and maybe occasionally give myself a hard poke to replace what I'd lose. Yeah, a hard poke should suffice for your efforts during our sparring sessions."

"Ha ha." Zackel said, having removed the plank from the basement door and undone the lock. The smell of rotting ogre corpse wafted up to strike him like a slap as he opened it.

"Bllerrrrrggghhhh." Zackel said, popping his nose plugs in before retrieving his staff and torch. He slowly began making his way down the stairs.

"Be careful Zackel." Rielle said behind him.

"I always am, Rielle." Zackel said, casting his light down to see if there was any way he was getting past the corpses at the bottom of the basement stairs without stepping in something unpleasant.

Luck was with him: the rotting ogre corpse had bounced off the wall and moved mostly away from the stairs, hence allowing Zackel to get over the body in one large step. He quickly glanced around the basement room, assessing if he was alone, and then turned his fire back to the closest ogre's body. He did not examine it long: the festering mess the cadaver was well on its way to turning into quickly drove from Zackel's mind the possibility that _this _corpse would be rising and causing them any trouble.

Just to be on the safe side, Zackel drove a spear of ice through its head. He wouldn't put the dark re-animating magics that had been unleashed on Azeroth past anything. For the rest, Rielle or his efforts had already pulverized the brain.

"Anything?" Rielle called down.

"Looking." Zackel replied, casting the light of his fire back across the basement room. Besides the ogre corpses, there was little else in the room. A few rotten boxes, heaps of garbage, a mostly ruined chair, a mold-covered painting, and a fair among of cobwebs made up the décor of the room, and offered virtually no hiding places.

"…all right then." Zackel said, withdrawing a vial. He'd mixed it up in the first days in the fortress, when he hadn't been as sure that he and Rielle wouldn't be getting unexpected company. Now that that possibility had returned, so had the concoction. "Are you hiding?"

Zackel tossed the vial into the room, taking a deep breath and holding it as he did so. The glass container broke open on the slimy stone, a noxious purple miasma erupting from the chemical's reaction to air. It wasn't toxic, but the gas was so irritating on the lungs that any hiding creature under any kind of vision-glamour would have been unable to keep from breaking into racking, stealth-destroying coughs. Zackel had to force his eyes open as the gas washed over him, the tincture making them water violently.

But, in the end, nothing was revealed. The gas quickly went inert, and Zackel let out the air in his lungs and wiped at his eyes.

"Guess not." Zackel said. He still cast the torch over the empty basement room a few more times, before finally turning and gingerly stepping over the ogre body to make his way up the stairs.

"So, anything?" Rielle repeated as Zackel emerged from the basement.

"Just a re-iteration." Zackel said. "Really, what the FEL would a ghost be doing out here?"

* * *

"Okay, I'm waiting." Rielle said a few minutes later, as the pair crept through the dark passageways of their home slash prison, the basement again locked up.

"Pardon?"

"You asked why a ghost would be out here, in here, more than once. Well, I don't have an answer, and we don't seem to have an intruder in any traditional sense, so you better produce one." Rielle said.

"The intruder or the answer?"

"I'll accept either. But since you're the one with the giant brain and the weak everything else, you should stick with your strengths."

"Weak? I'm actually making you try in those sparring matches!"

"No you're not."

"Oh bull."

"Not the topic either." Rielle said. "You heard something, yet we can't find anything. We need a reason beyond 'You're a paranoid twit'. So, let's consider possibilities. What happened here?"

"I got stuck with a draenei with a tongue so sharp she probably never kissed a man for fear of accidentally giving them a lobotomy."

The way Rielle lifted her axe, placed the end against Zackel's neck, and pushed him against the wall was done with the utmost of care…and yet still managed to get Rielle's point across loud and clear.

"Try again. Squishy." Rielle said.

"Kingdom of Alterac." Zackel said rapidly, as Rielle removed her axe. Zackel felt at his throat: not even a drop of blood. Then again, he hadn't expected much less. "Of the seven kingdoms that formed the Alliance during the Second War, Alterac was the weakest. Its master, Aiden Perenolde, became afraid of what would happen if the orc hordes would win, so he betrayed the Alliance and collaborated with them in exchange for safety. This proved to be a poor choice, and his actions were uncovered and the kingdom was crushed for its treachery. Plans to grant it to others didn't work out, and it fell into ruin, the Crushridge Clan moved in, and most of what remained of Alterac ended up as the Syndicate, a band of thugs lead by Aiden and his kin trying to get their land back. Just one of the several thousand tragic messes of our past several decades."

"Tragic enough to cause something and/like prompt a haunting?"

"Possibly…" Zackel said, slowly moving the torch around the hallway. "But from what I recall, most displaced spirits and hostile ghosts and all the creatures in that vein have some link in fel magic. That's why there's so many ghosts wandering the Plaguelands and Darkshire. As far as I know, nothing in that vein ever happened here…but then again…" Zackel said, trailing off.

"…yeah?"

"There's an expression among mages. A good bell is heard far, a bad bell still further." Zackel said. "It technically applies to magic improvisation going wrong…but it could also be said to apply to the reach of magic, and how much further it can go than expected. A lot of the Kingdoms were touched by darkness when the Scourge came. I suppose…some of it could have drifted down here. Manifested or stirred something up."

"Okay. Why now?" Rielle said. "Why not bother the ogres?"

"Too simple-minded, perhaps?" Zackel said. "A lot of ogres won't notice they're on fire until they smell the smoke. Maybe it had nothing to work with until…until…"

"Work with? What, is it playing with us? Why would it bother doing THAT?"

"An average stranded spirit wouldn't. It would have attacked us immediately. They're pretty much just residual traces of immensely strong emotion, all of it bad. But…" Zackel murmured. "There's always exceptions. Which is, in a way, worse. If a spirit is capable of hiding away, biding its time, and initiating whatever it wants with as subtle a hand as this could theoretically be…well, I really hope that's not the case. Because something like that is so powerful it held onto its mind after its physical body died, and so refined in its desire for whatever it wants, and it never wants anything good, that it's taken this long and started this quietly…"

"I get it. You're screwed."

"Well I could just…wait what?"

"_You're_ screwed. I'll just hit it when it comes until it goes away."

"…you know, I really wonder why we didn't put you in charge of our offensive efforts against Northrend. I'm sure your 'Strike a problem until it ceases being one' strategy would have produced outstanding results and the troops would have all been home by now."

"And you're soon to be even more screwed, because when it comes for you, you won't be able to walk." Rielle said.

"Make sure you hit me in the head too, I think I'd prefer a coma to your gloating."

"Seriously though Zack. Theorizing the worst is all fine and good…but all we have are some odd noises."

"And nightmares."

"Okay fine, nightmares. Hardly breaks down to an evil spirit, even based on your possibilities, and I'm not so stupid to dismiss them entirely…but I'm not so naïve to just accept your theories because they sound good either. I've had my own experiences, with the Scourge, fel magic, AND spirit creatures, and I just don't see a ghost coming out of nowhere playing with us like this."

"…There's another expression I know. Hunters say it." Zackel said. "What is play for the cat is death for the mouse."

"…….yeah, I get what they're saying." Rielle said, turning the axe over in her hands.

"But that's my secondary thought." Zackel said, turning around and heading down the hallway.

"What?"

"Your words jogged something in my head. We're asking why, if anything is in here with us, it showed up now, instead of bothering the ogres. I might have an answer."

"Which is?"

"I might have let it out."

* * *

"Oh yeah, this place. Where you used my axe as a damn crowbar." Rielle said, back in the same storage room that she'd fallen on Zackel in several days before. "Don't think you're doing that again. You want that door you found opened again, you can pry it with your fingernails."

"Did I mention before how I found this door?" Zackel said, ignoring Rielle's comment.

"You said you didn't notice it before."

"Yes. That was because it was behind an old bookcase. If I hadn't looked at precisely the right angle, we might have had considerable trouble with some of our washing tasks, considering I found our washing tub in there."

"Just because a bookcase was in front of it doesn't mean anything. Ogres could have done it. Moved the case there for another reason, given the impression they were trying to hide the door."

"Maybe." Zackel said, as he began fiddling with the entryway again. "But…something else occurs to me."

"And that is?"

"That tub is made of wood. A lot of the wood in here has seen better days, even with some of the ogres trying to keep them intact, and that's a whole 'nother can of worms considering we're talking about ogres. Yet that tub was…more well preserved than I like. Almost like it was sealed up in a vacuum."

"…and you broke it."

"…let's hope I'm wrong." Zackel said, and with a slight tug, the door opened.

Zackel was pretty sure the whisper was just in his head. He leaned in, casting the torch and its light into the concealed chamber.

"…then again, I might have been so pleased to find the tub I failed to assess other things." Zackel said, relaxing a bit. The semi-hidden room was just as wrecked as the remaining of the fortress had been. Maybe no one had opened the door in a while, but it was clear the ogres had been in here. Which likely meant Zackel hadn't broken open anything, and he was putting together a few coincidences in the wrong way…

"Really. Did you see that writing?"

"…what?" Zackel said, casting the torchlight in the direction Rielle was pointing at. His relief was quickly swallowed by the cold prickling sensation that ran up his spine. There WAS writing on the wall. Writing he hadn't seen when he'd explored the room the first time and found the tub.

Worse, he recognized it. It wasn't just any casual graffiti.

"Wait, I think I can make some of this out…for a good…time…contact…" Rielle said, before Zackel held up a hand. "Shit, you can read it. Why am I not surprised?"

"It's Thalassian. The old elven language, and what a lot of magic is written in." Zackel said, crossing over. "…not very clear though. This is either very old, or someone tried to…scour it off the stone. Or both."

"Which is worse?"

"…scouring." Zackel said. He did not add that said action could easily be linked to the trashed room, which had initially calmed Zackel down with the concept that he hadn't broken any long-forgotten seal. Other possibilities were coming to mind now, worse ones. Like the idea that something had been in here and let out before, and had commanded someone to erase any warning or advice on containing or stopping it, and had been doing who knows what when a mage had wandered along and locked himself in a castle with it…

"Well, what does it say? The wall?" Rielle said, startling Zackel out of his neurotic musing. "Come on, I don't have all night."

"Trying to read…" Zackel said, as he began doing so. "…_Forever in our hands…burden of choice…_something _star echoes _something something _voice…_might be _voices_…_in that…_and the rest is too messed up to translate, I'm afraid."

"Right. Figures…" Rielle said, looking around the wrecked room. There was nothing in it that connected decidedly with the few words Zackel had managed to translate: what that meant, who could say. "So, what…did we haul up the stairs and take a bath in the Washtub of Ill Omens, or something?"

"The ogres might have shoved that in here, the tub that is…maybe at the same time they let out whatever was in here. Or took whatever was in here. Or…ticked off whatever was in here…" Zackel said.

"Zack! Zackel. Look at me." Rielle said, pointing to herself. "Now listen. OR, whatever was in here was taken when the Alliance came down on Alterac and wrecked it. Taken by the Alliance, or Perpugilliam or whatever his name was. Which means there is no reason that any bad mojo should be waking up NOW just to bother US, which would end up making this just a bunch of eerie coincidences. Don't forget _that _possibility, Zackel. Might help with all the scary ones you're currently coming up with." Rielle said.

"…right." Zackel said, trying to moisten his dry mouth. "This doesn't mean anything. This could be an old blessing, or…commendation or something. It's too worn down to tell. And the rest of things…well, it is an old castle. And it's surrounded by a storm. And there is such a thing as cabin fever."

"Good man."

"I am still guessing you won't object to another sweep."

"Better man. I've seen a lot, Zackel. Never said I've seen it all." Rielle said. "Lead the way."

"You know, if I get mauled, my blood is going to spray all over you."

"You say that like it's a bad thing." Rielle said. However, she then proceeded to take the lead.

* * *

"So, you've checked all the traps you laid down, right? For freshness?" Rielle said some time later. The pair were back in their sleeping quarters, both doors closed and locked and the fire built back up to a roaring inferno.

"Yes. Shored them up if needed. Even laid a few new ones down. Just in case." Zackel said. "As neither of us has an overt connection to the Light and hence can't perform an exorcism, there's nothing much else we can do."

"Unless something happens."

"Unless yes, that." Zackel said, drinking from his canteen.

"…don't worry so much Zackel. There's still a lot of things it could be that wouldn't be any danger to us."

"And if it is?"

"We'll handle it." Rielle said, patting Zackel's wrist. "The Light is in all things, not just its devoted servants. It will come if needed."

"I suppose the chosen species of the naaru would know best." Zackel said. "Still…I'm not exactly in the mood to go back to sleep."

"Ohhhhh! Let's roast sugar-fluff and tell ghost stories!" Rielle said. The sour look Zackel gave her took some of the edge off her amusement, but not wholly. "Seriously Zack, you need something to distract you."

"Telling ghost stories is not going to be it." Zackel said. "I'm nervous, and you…are you."

"Pardon?"

"I suspect there are hardly any scary, disturbing, or anything that initiates a chance in one's normal emotional state stories, ghost or otherwise, that could rattle you."

"Ah. Smart boy." Rielle said, poking Zackel in the forehead. "You're right on the mark."

"…key word being, hardly." Zackel said calmly.

"What? Oh ho. You think you have something up your sleeve? Please Zackel, stick to poetry. I've fought things that would turn you white and your pants brown. There is no spooky story under the sun, moon, or otherwise that can get to me." Rielle said, leaning forward and cupping her face. "But you clearly want to try. Please do. Your failures are so amusing in their consistency and scope."

"…heh." Zackel said, drinking from his canteen. "Inhale, Rielle. Take in as much air as you can. This story should last about as long as you can hold your breath, and then just a little bit longer."

"You serious?"

"No, it's just to…set the atmosphere." Zackel said. "You ever heard the gnomish term _Windilim Potlowter? _It means, roughly translated, 'The Madness of Experimentation'. Now, the term's meaning seems obvious on its face. Gnomes are renowned for their curiosity, inventiveness, and all the positive and negative things that have come from that. The term is usually used comically, in those stories where something blows up in the gnome's face and causes them to grow a tail…but not always. Not always. To gnomes, it applies to the way that, for some people, and not just gnomes, you never truly understand the consequences of any act, of any stripe…until you finally do. Any act. And there's many forms of experimentation, Rielle. This…is one I heard one night, late in Ironforge, over why the gnome's attempts to build a heated pool seemed to have stopped. Experimentation, you see…"

* * *

"…that is, you might say, their invisible carrot." Zackel finished several minutes later. "Now…you can take a good, deep breath. Our erstwhile experimenter, well…he still has not."

"……………………………what the _FEL_ is wrong with you?!" Rielle said, erupting out of what had appeared to be a stunned state to smack Zackel across the head. "Where the fel do you hear these stories?"

"Like I said…"

"You mages are sick! You take your big brains and you make sick things! Get lost! No sick people in my bed!" Rielle snapped, as she began kicking at Zackel with her hooved foot. Said motions finally clued Zackel in that she was comically exaggerating her shock. Still, he was pretty sure he'd managed to touch SOMETHING in her. For someone who had seen as much as Rielle, it really spoke to the potency of the tale he'd told. When the gnome he'd heard it from had told it that night, Zackel was pretty sure he'd disgusted the entire bar, and a few dwarfs had later bought him a round of drinks for actually telling a story that had provoked a reaction, even if it was one of horrified disgust.

"Okay, okay…going." Zackel said, crawling over to his bed. "Sweet dreams."

"You're not too far away that I can't hit you with a log, Zackel."

"All the logs are over here."

"I meant from the fire."

"I'll shut up now." Zackel said, trying to settle down. Despite his efforts, it took him some effort to drift off to sleep…

Sleep he was pulled out of by a hand on his shoulder.

"GUH!" Zackel said, starting up at the touch.

"Zackel, Zackel, relax. It's me." Rielle said. The fire illuminated the draenei's nearly naked form, Rielle having stripped back down to her underwear to sleep herself. Zackel blinked repeatedly, trying to fully return to sense.

"What happened?"

"You were having a nightmare. Decided to wake you out of it."

"I…was?" Zackel said, trying to remember if he had been dreaming.

"Yeah. Pretty bad. Thought I better bring you out of it." Rielle said. "I'm not having a much easier time sleeping myself."

"…wonderful. Maybe I should have kept that story to myself." Zackel muttered. "Well, got any ideas how to pass the time?"

"…well…a few…" Rielle said. It was around then that Zackel realized how close she was.

"…Rielle?" Zackel said, as the draenei lightly put her hand on Zackel's bare chest. When had he taken his shirt off…

"I'm not an idiot, Zackel. I've seen how you look at me. I can tell what you think." Rielle breathed. "I figure…enough testing to see if you're an asshole. You're not. You're…special. And quite frankly…you're the only one here." Rielle said, as she gently pushed Zackel down.

"Uh…well uh…"

"It's all right…" Rielle said, leaning down. Zackel, his eyes wide as saucers, finally remembered to blink.

And in doing so, Rielle's purple features shifted to blazing red.

"_**LITTLE WORM."**_

Zackel tried to scream, but the barbed teeth seemed to eat the cry even as they sank into his face.

* * *

"GYAAAAAHHHHHH!" Zackel semi-shrieked, rearing up out of his furs so hard he nearly passed out from the intense sense of vertigo.

"WHOA! Yikes! Down, Zackel! Down!" Rielle said, having woken the mage up again. It was that unexpected mirror on the alien's part that caused Zackel to recoil away from the draenei's voice, his wide panicked eyes darting all over (considerably more clothed) body.

"You, what, YOU!" Zackel stammered.

"Zackel calm down. You were having a nightmare."

"YOU JUST SAID THAT!"

"What?!"

"PROVE THIS ISN'T A DREAM!"

The sound of the slap Rielle delivered to Zackel's head echoed across the room.

"…..OWWWWWWWWWWW…that was a little more proof than I required!" Zackel said, clutching his head as reality fully settled onto his senses.

"I aim to please." Rielle said, crossing her arms. "Seriously, you were _really _moaning and groaning this time. So bad you managed to start keeping me awake. If you're going to have nightmares, keep them to yourself."

"Ugh…was it that bad?" Zackel said, looking for his canteen.

"Pretty much." Rielle said. "…you all right, Zackel? What were you dreaming about?"

_Laughing…_

_Hot blood on his face._

"_BEG."_

"…nothing. Can't remember." Zackel said, peering down the spout of his drinking container like it would take away the pain and fear that flowed briefly through him.

"…want some company?"

"…what?" Zackel said, looking up, the sick sensation flowing through him dampening slightly due to the surprise.

"You can pull your blankets closer to mine. Bask in my protection." Rielle said. The way she said the second sentence managed to fully suppress Zackel's bad feelings, making him narrow his eyes instead.

"…bull. You just want me close so you can lean over and smack me if I bother you instead of having to crawl over."

"This offer has a short shelf life." Rielle replied, as if Zackel hadn't guessed her true intentions.

"Never said I wouldn't take it." Zackel grumbled, as he began gathering up his tangled furs. "I just ask that you don't throw me across the room."

"Oh please. Too much effort."

It was notable that when Zackel went back to sleep, Rielle now only a few feet away from him rather than across the room, he did not awaken until the next morning. Either he'd slept peacefully, or Rielle had stayed her hand.

* * *

Of course, upon the next morning, the draenei had immediately initiated a sparring session based on their bedding already being drawn together. The next two hours were filled with the usual beating and mockery, Rielle having a grand old time and Zackel acquiring several new bruises.

Still, it was comforting in its familiar-ness. Cold comfort, but he would take what he could get.

That may have been a mistake. Because the whole series of events, from Rielle's offer to tell ghost stories to finding a new excuse to beat him up, caused the tiny, nagging bit of information that had been drifting around the back of his head during it all to eventually sink into the depths of his mind, unrecalled.

The one crucial detail he'd overlooked in all of his efforts to determine what had bothered him the previous night.

There were ogre corpses in the basement. Zackel had seen them.

Three of them.

In cleaning out the castle, Zackel and Rielle had indeed killed three ogres.

The problem was…

That wasn't where it had ended.

They had killed five.


	14. Living On The Edge

Chapter 14: Living On The Edge

Journal Entry No # 445

_Learned lesson while being trained, about magic. Magicians have to learn to doubt everything, to allow our bodies and minds to properly harness the power of the arcane, and then we have to learn to never doubt ANYTHING, because in doing so we can lose control of our own power. This paradox often serves as a final test for rookie mages: if you can't figure it out, you wash out. I myself didn't have too much trouble with it: I simply approached it in terms like the wind. Just because I can't see the wind doesn't mean it's not there, and all that. _

_Maybe I would have made a decent shaman, if the darn Draenei weren't hogging all that knowledge to themselves._

_Yes, I know it's not their choice. They're still stupid. Rielle, if you're getting up to hit me, I'd like to remind you that you are INVADING MY PRIVACY AND HAVE NO REAL RIGHT TO._

_Back to point. _

_That fine balance works great for magic, but not so well when you're trying to address a potential problem. Like whether or not a place is haunted. The only comfort we have, or rather I have, is that in general, evil spirits are not sophisticated in their dealings. Which means the odds favor it just being in our heads._

_Well, my head. Having not turned up anything, Rielle had already pretty much dismissed this as nothing. I really can't tell if she's ignorant or enlightened for doing that._

_There's still that hidden room, and the weird writing I found. And I'd lay money the sounds are not just my imagination. Now, whether that means they're just the castle or the wind…_

_Believe in anything. Believe nothing._

…_sometimes, being a mage really, really sucks.

* * *

_

Despite what Zackel had theorized, Rielle had not completely dismissed the recent incident. Her giant ears were not just on her head for balancing her face, and she'd used that fact as she'd sprinted and jogged through the fortress during her morning run. However, she'd heard no strange or out of place noises, nor felt any indication that anyone (or anything) was observing, following, or stalking her. And while Rielle wouldn't call herself an expert in stealth, she'd learned enough to survive in Northrend, where a constant stream of Horde had a dozen different options to sneak up or get the drop on you. True, it wasn't like the Alliance was denied those options themselves, but Rielle had almost always been on their receiving end instead of the giving one. That was probably the more useful lesson here, considering the situation.

She almost hoped some Horde HAD somehow found this place and were the source of the noise. Despite her best efforts, she was starting to go a touch stir crazy, and bashing the hell out of a member of that group of monsters and fiends would have been wonderfully cathartic. Unless she somehow got one of the decent ones, but considering in what short supply those seemed to be, she didn't lay odds on it.

Back in reality, and having found no more evidence supporting her companion's worries, Rielle returned to their sleeping quarters to find that said worries were still foremost on his mind.

"What are you doing?" Rielle said. The fact that Zackel didn't jump when she spoke, despite not looking at her at all when she'd entered, re-indicated to her that the mage was considerably more alert to danger than he normally was.

"An old trick I used to do. Dragging it back out." Zackel said, as he jerked up his foot and tried to use the motion to toss his staff up into his hand. The staff only made it a few feet into the air, and well out of range of Zackel's grasping fingers, causing the blue-haired mage to grimace. "Apparently I'm rustier than I thought."

"You're trying to kick your staff into your hand."

"Yes."

"Don't you have some magic spell to call it into your hand?"

"Always good to have other options." Zackel said.

"Isn't this a rather IMPRACTICAL one?"

"It distracts me, so no." Zackel replied. Rielle rolled her eyes and headed over to her bedding, taking a few minutes before she had breakfast/lunch (the two, in their efforts to conserve their remaining real food, had restricted themselves to two meals a day) to check their remaining provisions and that they were staying properly preserved. Much to her (lack of) surprise, when she'd finished and turned back around to look at Zackel, he was STILL performing the kick-up staff trick.

"Would it help if I found a white sheet and put it over myself and came in moaning?" Rielle asked.

"Ha ha. No." Zackel replied, and resumed doing the kick-toss. Rielle watched for a few more minutes before the tedium finally got to her, and she stood up and walked over.

"Hey, you. If you want something to do, I could use another bath." Rielle said.

"You smell fine." Zackel replied. That earned him a smack across the back of the head. "OW! Well, YOU DO!"

"You're not who I'm trying to approve." Rielle said. "If you really have so much spare nervous energy, you can put it to good use."

"I really would…"

"March!" Rielle said, giving Zackel a decent push. "Get to burning! Nervous energy that is."

* * *

Journal Entry No # 446

_She thinks she knows me. She's stubborn like that._

_Me? More stubborn than Draenei under right circumstances.

* * *

_

"…oh you have got to be kidding me." Rielle said. She had indeed gone through the entire bathing process again, including blindfolding Zackel and making him assist, but unlike last time Zackel's head was clearly ten miles away, and as soon as she'd said she was done he'd fumbled his way out the door and closed it. When Rielle had gotten dressed and headed out that way, she'd found him practicing the kick-toss in the hallway outside.

"…you need to get _LAID_, wizard." Rielle said, leaning against the wall.

"…maybe." Zackel replied. "But as you might have guessed, that's not exactly an option here, is it?"

"Are you insulting me?"

"You decide." Zackel said, giving the draenei a brief glance before walking past her into the sleeping quarters. "However, I think I've taken this about as far as I can go. Time for Phase 2."

"Oh really. What's that involve, standing on your hands and firing the staff with your feet?"

"At least I'd have the means to do so." Zackel retorted lamely.

"All you have is an insult about my hooves? You ARE slipping."

"I'd rather be slipping in trading barbs than when it counts." Zackel said, as he produced his cleaning mirror and held it up, aiming his staff behind him.

"What are you doing?"

"Another old party trick. I used to be a half decent shot firing my staff behind my back without looking. Never used it in combat, but…"

"Whatever." Rielle said in mild exasperation at her companion's paranoia, heading over to another part of the room and starting into her combat routines. She was not much surprised (again) when she finished running through every single one and found Zackel was STILL practicing his behind the back shots, the wall behind him covered with pitted ice.

"Are you still doing that?"

"No, I'm attempting to establish a new school of absurdist art. Yes Rielle, I am."

"What use is that trick anyway? Anything with half-decent reflex could probably dodge the likely-sloppy shots that would come from such a move."

"All I need is one good hit. You'd think you'd know a thing or two about one good hit."

"Oh now the meat sack is lecturing me on proper blow integers. Maybe you should learn to take a punch before you talk."

"Maybe you should learn how to avoid them before you do." Zackel said with a wry smirk. Narrowing her eyes, Rielle marched over to the mage and drew herself to her full height, something that managed to cow (mostly comically, but with a touch of seriousness) Zackel. Due to the nature of her legs, it was easy to forget how easy it was for the alien to look down on him.

"Come now, mage. Would you like to learn some serious combat?"

"I really don't want to get repeatedly slammed into the ground again…"

"No no, not sparring. Well, yes, sparring…but something more boring. To me anyway." Rielle said, as she walked over to her axe, having set the weapon down before she'd looked in on Zackel's behind the back training.

"Oh, so a lack of pain to you is BORING. Sadist."

"Weakling."

"Barbarian."

"Cream puff."

"Savage."

"Invertebrate."

"…degene…no wait that doesn't really fit…wait, you know what invertebrate means?"

"I'm a WARRIOR, Zack. Best to know a thing or two about skeletal structures and what the lack thereof means, hmmmm?" Rielle said. "Stop questioning my intelligence."

"But it comes so easy."

"And I'll bet YOU DO TOO." Rielle said, flicking Zackel in the forehead.

"Ow, ow. Low blow."

"Now you're catching on." Rielle said, assuming a combat stance. "Okay Zackel, in all seriousness…try and keep your staff in your hands."

"That's what SHE said!"

"She had that little confidence in you?"

"No, she…I mean…that is…sigh. Just chop my head off. It will probably be less painful."

"Better use of a head too."

"You won't damage my staff?" Zackel said, changing the subject.

"Trust me."

"All right." Zackel said, holding up his staff. In three seconds, Rielle had used her axe to twist it out of his hands and into one of hers.

"Okay, I really won't complain about your stance. It's probably not on the curriculum, OH LOOK ANOTHER BIG WORD I KNOW, and we combat classes don't tend to mix and match much. More's the pity." Rielle said, putting down her axe and stepping around Zackel, pressing in close to him. "Okay first, try and stand like this…"

* * *

"You know, I don't think I'm THAT poor a student. I think you just can't keep away from me." Zackel commented a few hours of training later.

"I'm ALSO in a very condition to use your face as a wall sander." Rielle said, seizing Zackel's hair as she stood behind him and giving it a brief yank to show she meant business. "Oh that note, hair grabbing can be very effective. Helps control the body direction. Well, unless you're smart enough to grease your hair up first, but that's something else. Okay now." Rielle said, gliding in close and placing her fingers over Zackel's arm. "Blow to the left!"

Zackel did a basic block.

"Up!"

Another.

"Up!"

And so on it went for a touch over a minute, before Rielle finally stopped yelling commands.

"I don't think I screwed up there."

"Good boy." Rielle whispered in his ear. Her eyes widened as she felt his body abruptly tense up. "What? Just me mage. The only woman in a hundred miles lacking enough shame to get close to you."

"………right." Zackel said, stepping away from Rielle and heading for their water canteen. Finding it empty, he began to focus on re-filling it.

"Toss it over here when you're done." Rielle said. Zackel did so, and Rielle drank deeply from the water container before she pulled it back and dumped the rest over her face and upper body. "Ah, the pause that refreshes."

"If you're desperate enough." Zackel said, and ducked when Rielle threw the empty container at him.

"I'm not the one who spent repeated long stretches of time on the roof. Alone."

"…I was trying to STOP THE STORM. Like you ORDERED."

"Yes, and you've had REAAALLLLL success there, haven't you. I'd say that reinforces my theory."

"I'll reinforce your…never mind, that sounded better in my head."

"Like everything else."

"A rag and a bone and a hank of hair, but the young fool yet called it his lady fair…!" Zackel intoned, gesturing dramatically towards Rielle. "Nope, that sounded even better coming out this time."

"So will all your blood." Rielle said, as she seized up the axe and began chasing Zackel around.

"Okay, really! I need some more help! I have an idea! Really! Stop chasing me! Watch that thing! Hey! You can stop now! Now would be good! ACK! WATCH THAT EDGE!"

"Light, you suck so bad at this. I think I'm actually getting worse."

* * *

Journal Entry No # 447

_After she was done making me collapse with exhaustion, Rielle did listen to my idea. Thought it had a little potential. But it was getting late, so we turned in for the night._

_Should have known. I woke up feeling like someone had run a Goblin Presser over me. Rielle, of course, was bright eyed and bushy tailed. Well, her tail remained as smoothly cute as it always is, but you get the picture. She told me that I had to learn stretches._

_Learning stretches hurt. A lot._

_Then she declared it was time for more sparring to make up for all the time she was 'wasting' on my weak rear end._

_Sparring continues to hurt. A lot. More._

_Sat down to rest, ended up falling asleep. Somewhat surprised when I woke up on my bedding. Of course, that was because Rielle was prodding me with her foot because she bored and wanted me to play Thrust._

_Didn't hear anything, playing late into the night._

_Don't know what to think of that exactly.

* * *

_

"_Sontar-ha…rutan…" _Zackel whispered the next day, as the blade of ice slowly formed in his hand. "_Rutan…mutterspirel…tan."_

"Nice. Though I fail to see how a melting, slippery blade would be much use." Rielle said from where she was leaning against the wall.

"Not a problem in the hands of a mage who knows what they're doing." Zackel said, as he gave the sword a few swings.

"Here's another." Rielle said, picking up her axe and swinging it into the ice-sword. To her (actual) surprise, while she knocked the sword out of Zackel's hand, the ice did not break.

"It's not just some random icicle off a roof, Rielle. I'm not going to make a makeshift blade without making sure it's suitably dense." Zackel said, walking over to retrieve the ice sword and running his fingers along it to fix any damage the alien might have caused, as well as reinforce it some more. "Okay, weapon's ready Rielle. I am your student."

"Okay…same basic stance…" Rielle said, walking up to Zackel and slipping behind him. "Now, a sword's a pretty different animal from a staff. It's best to try and have your shoulders…like this…" Rielle said, trying to make Zackel adjust himself. "Your head needs to be tilted up a bit…right then…"

Zackel tried to focus through Rielle's constant touch and adjustment, which was bothering him more than he'd like to admit. If someone had asked, though, he wouldn't have been able to really give a reason why.

Unfortunately, he was also not good enough to conceal it.

"Yeesh. Loosen up, Zackel. You're as tight as a wire. I won't bite." Rielle said. "What's going on? Are you still worried about possible intruders?"

"…it has crossed my mind."

"I thought we were doing this to get your mind off that."

"It _IS_ helping." Zackel said, making a point not to specify why.

"Let's switch gears then." Rielle said, removing herself from Zackel's personal space and producing her dagger. "Make with the mojo."

"On it." Zackel said, holding out his hand. Blue energy began misting over to the dagger, ice forming and expanding on its blade until Zackel had transformed it into another stopgap ice-sword.

"Hmmm. Not bad on the weight, mage." Rielle said, turning the sword over in her hand.

"I aim to please."

"Explains a lot." Rielle replied. Zackel didn't know if he was being insulted or not, and kept quiet as Rielle swung the sword a few times.

"Okay. Sword's not my area of expertise, but I think I can teach you a few basics." Rielle said, stepping up next to Zackel. "Here's the first basic drills. Number one…"

To _his _surprise, Zackel found, over the next ten or so minutes, he actually wasn't too bad at (very, very) basic swordsmanship. He was also smart enough to keep his mouth shut about that fact, lest Rielle showed him how little he actually knew.

"Zackel!"

"Yeah?! What!?" Zackel said, jumping a bit.

"You gave me shoddy work! Your teaching aid is melting!" Rielle said, indicating her 'sword'.

"Really? Thought I put more juice into it than that. Here, allow me…" Zackel said, holding his hand out to take the sword.

"No need. Just come over here and do it." Rielle said, holding the sword up.

"What, think I'll steal your dagger?"

"No, it's a warrior thing. You need to really get used to a certain weapon, and letting it go can interrupt that process."

"How very zen." Zackel said, walking over and holding a hand out, moving it over the ice blade as he worked to rebuild and strengthen it.

"You do have nice eyes."

"Hmmmm?" Zackel said, looking up at Rielle's face.

"Was thinking of your story with Jasciona last night. When you came over here, that observation of hers popped into my head. She was right. "

"…thanks. And you have nice…" Zackel said, said eyes darting around as he tried to find the right word. "Uh…horns?"

Rielle's face crinkled up, which would have looked kind of cute if she hadn't proceeded to raise her hand. Zackel, expecting another forehead flick, instead found Rielle honking and lightly twisting his nose.

"Ah, it's real. Which means you're just dumb for not being able to tell that you stink. Well, overall, but ESPECIALLY at compliments." Rielle said. "So much for Mr. On The Spot Poetry."

"Hey, no one succeeds all of the time." Zackel complained.

"It would be nice if you succeeded at all. Actually no, that would probably be so shocking I'd drop dead of a heart attack."

"I consider a liar to be worse off than someone poor with flattery." Zackel said with light sarcasm.

"I consider someone who can break their insulter in half better than someone who can't."

"…Let's get back to training now."

"Darn straight." Rielle said, as Zackel turned around. "Wait, Zackel."

"Hmmmm?"

"Loosen up. You're still tense as fel, and it's impacting your efforts."

"…right." Zackel said. Whether he succeeded in following Rielle's advice for the rest of their practice, he couldn't say.

* * *

Journal Entry No # 448

_I'm…really not sure how I feel about Rielle._

_I'd like to think we've become friends, and that none of her insults are serious any more. But…I'm not wholly sure if there isn't some hidden venom behind them. I can't tell why. One would think Sparse, but Rielle seems well adjusted enough to not let that affect her so much. That nagging strangeness…it's starting to really loom over my thoughts._

_The worst part is, I don't know if it's her. It might be me. And what happened. No matter what I try to do, I keep linking her to it. I feel it's…getting in the way?_

_Still not sure what to do about it. Figuring out if we're alone in this castle would help._

_However, I have conceived of another solution, however small and temporary it may be…

* * *

_

"Whatever you're making, make more of that breath stuff. It's starting to stink again. Your breath, that is. Well you do to, in all aspects, but that goes without saying." Rielle said, as Zackel hunched over the table, various alchemy tools around him.

"I still have some left. I'll just use it later." Zackel said, as he dripped a blue compound into a yellow base.

"So what ARE you making?"

"It's a surprise."

"Don't like surprises. Tell me."

"It's a chemical mix that will remove the stench from your excrement, hence drawing it in line with how you view it."

"Ha ha." Rielle said, and lightly smacked Zackel across the head as was her want.

"Please don't do that." Zackel said.

"Oh look, are we growing a spine? Finally?"

"I have one. It's not helping. And no." Zackel said. "I'm working with limited chemicals here, and also not the safest ones. By myself they're fine, but if we add you, well…results could go worse."

"You're just trying to find an excuse to not get hit."

"Why don't you keep smacking me and find out?"

Rielle promptly began to (very lightly) Zackel repeatedly on the top of the head.

"Okay seriously Rielle, knock it off. I said KNOCK IT OFF!" Zackel said, jerking towards the draenei, something which did make her take a step back. "Please."

"Sorry." Rielle said, sounding genuine.

"Thank you. Okay then." Zackel said, turning back to his work.

"I still want to know what you're doing."

"Something to help us pass the time."

"And you need so much focus because…what, you risk making a poison gas and killing us both?"

"Nothing THAT serious…but I've learned to treat every mix you make as an alchemist with the same degree of caution." Zackel said. "Back in my early days learning the field, I had a bad incident with training, a kid who didn't listen to his trainer about the risks, and an additive."

"Oh really. Do you happen to recall what that additive was?"

"Nitroglycerine."

"And the results were?"

"Negative."

"And?"

"Noisy."

"NOISY!?" Rielle semi-yelled, causing Zackel to jerk and scramble to get a grip on his vials. He shot an intense glare at the draenei, who responded with an innocent smile that Zackel would have found very appealing if he wasn't so annoyed with the woman.

"You know, I could get you Rielle."

"You already get me. You get me everything." Rielle replied with semi-fake smugness.

"Oh this won't be something you'd like." Zackel said. "I'm the one who has to gather all our drinking water. There are definitely a few…THINGS I could add to it."

"I'd kick your ass for it."

"Oh no, you'd be far too busy dealing with the other issues revolving around your rear end it would present you. Even if you caught me, you'd need me to make an antidote."

"Ah ha ha ha." Rielle said, before she reached out and seized Zackel by the chin, the humor leaving her expression. "I do like you, Zackel. I really do. So let me very strongly state that something like you're suggesting is making you head out onto thin ice."

"…okay." Zackel squeaked.

"You ARE getting better though. I don't think I've had to threaten you with violence for a few days. I'll get you trained yet." Rielle said, letting go.

"Is that what you do with all your men? Train them?"

"Oh please, don't even start STRAYING into that tone." Rielle said, though her annoyance didn't sound like it was directed at Zackel. "I'll fully admit that I'm not perfect. Most of you men can't even _CONCEIVE_ of that concept. I'm not even talking about Sparse and co, it's all of you. Most of the time, you're good for a few rolls in the hay, or some laughs, or an extra sword. Beyond that, you always seemed lacking."

"…present company included?" Zackel said. Rielle paused, putting a hand on her chin as she considered her answer.

"…I'll get back to you."

"Yes, getting back sounds like a good idea. Especially in regards to a response to your constant badgering while I try and work." Zackel said, as he withdrew something from his robes. "So, since my first thought was subpar for…various reasons, I figure I can just take the simple route and keep you from pestering me by threatening you with this inflated animal bladder I had deep in my bags."

"Oh really." Rielle said, looking at the engorged sack. Apparently Zackel had correctly guessed that she'd be annoying him, and prepared beforehand, just needing the right moment to pull it out.

"Yes. With this weapon, I am now in a superior position to you. It's design holds a great deal, as well as disguises its contents, and allows me distance options in my offensive efforts."

"Yessssss." Rielle said, leaning in close and locking eyes with Zackel. Zackel found himself briefly absorbed in their depths for a few more seconds before he realized the draenei had something in her hand herself.

"I, on the other hand, have a knife."

One quick thrust and backwards dodge later, and Zackel was sitting with a wet face and chest, Rielle's very swift thrust having popped the makeshift balloon and gotten its contents (which was thankfully just water) all over the mage while she had gotten out of the way. He took a moment to look at Rielle's contented face, and then blew a wet bang of hair out of his eyes.

"That's the problem with weapons technology. It becomes obsolete so quickly."

* * *

"Oh, are you done now?" Rielle said, having gone for her semi-nightly run around the fortress and come back to find Zackel sitting cross-legged on the floor, holding one of their water canisters out in front of him.

"Just about…" Zackel said, as he dripped a few drops of a green liquid into the container, and then a few drops of a purple liquid before closing it up. "Okay, swirl it around, and…" The mage shook the canister and let it sit a moment before opening it and smelling the contents.

"Well?"

"Now the last, crucial part." Zackel said, as he produced one last vial of pink liquid and dripped it into the canister. Closing it up, he shook it firmly once more, this time for several seconds, before letting it sit again.

"Getting bored…!" Rielle insisted.

"Just…a few more seconds…" Zackel said, and then opened up the canister. "Moment of truth."

With that, Zackel drank from the container. Rielle tensed up, wondering just what was in the canister and if she was going to watch Zackel explode, melt, or turn into an animal.

Instead, he just lowered the canteen, smacking his mouth as he tasted whatever he had drank.

"I think I have it."

"Have what?" Rielle said, walking over and picking the water-holder up. While not a chemist, she recognized the smell when she sniffed it.

"…ale?"

"Not quite. Any self-respecting dwarf would probably gag and spit out what I've made. I say considering the tools at my disposal, any fermentation I'm able to do is damn good. And I think I did pretty well here." Zackel said. Rielle glanced at the wizard, and then drank from the canister. What was inside was a semi-sour, semi-sweet drink with the bitter hint of alcohol behind it.

"…you actually managed to brew a beer." Rielle said.

* * *

"Well, not exactly. I doubt it would sell anywhere…but considering what we have…"

"I'll take it. I'm getting sick of water." Rielle said, drinking more from the canteen. "How much more of this can you make?"

"A fair bit, provided we're careful. Which we should be. I just wanted to calm down some, not go all the way into vomiting, blackouts, and splitting headaches. Not that you could really reach that state with the concentration of that mix, but you get the picture." Zackel said. "Go bring out the Thrust board and I'll 'brew' some more of the drink. See if it helps pass the evening, or a few of them."

"You sure know how to show a girl a good time." Rielle said, tossing the canteen back to Zackel.

"Well, for a real good time I'd probably need considerable more chemicals and…a few lines of thought which are actually very, very disturbing to me."

"Just mix the drinks, bartender."

* * *

Zackel had not been wrong: a touch of alcohol did help to liven up the games and conversation that he and Rielle had shared until exhaustion had finally crept in and they'd gone to bed. Unlike Rielle, Zackel had chased all of his brew with water, and hence found himself waking up an hour after he'd gone to sleep with pressing needs.

He was on his way back when he heard the whispers. He froze to the spot, his eyes darting around.

"_**Still in denial…"**_

"_**Choice is at hand…"**_

"_**You know…"**_

Zackel grimaced, clutching his head. What had that been? Had he actually heard a whispering tone? He wasn't a hundred percent sure that his beverage wouldn't have side effects, but he WAS fairly sure that they wouldn't have included auditory hallucinations.

Which meant…

"_**Weak beggar…"**_

Zackel whirled around, misty blue energy forming around his hand. If there had been a voice, though, that was the last thing it said, leaving Zackel alone.

Zackel said nothing, as he turned around, slowly, and then started back to the sleeping chambers, also slowly. He finally came to a stop near Rielle, who was curled up and clearly in a deep sleep.

She hasn't heard anything.

Zackel stood there, grinding his teeth, before he turned towards his own bedding. He did not return to sleep himself: instead, he retrieved his staff. After doing that, he stood and considered what he'd decided while standing near the draenei.

The smart thing would have been to wake her up and bring her along. Splitting up was always frowned on in nearly every task in Azeroth, and by leaving her behind, he might be exposing her to danger. On the other hand, Rielle was good enough to look after herself, even asleep. Waking her up might irritate her, and would definitely result in more mockery heading his way if they didn't find anything. Which they likely wouldn't.

Whatever the problem was, it seemed to settle on him. He had to settle this issue himself, and involve her, if necessary, depending on what he found. If it was all in his head, he was the only one who could face it, when it came down to it.

Zackel spared Rielle one final glance, and then headed out of the sleeping quarters.

Waiting for the voice again, and whatever might lie behind it.

* * *

"_I'm searching for answers…_

_Cause something is not right…_

_I follow the signs…_

_I'm close to the fire…_

_I fear that soon you'll reveal…_

_Your dangerous mind…"_

* * *

Writer's Note: Yeah, sorry for all the cliffhangers and the somewhat filler-ish nature of this chapter. The middle was always the weakest part of this story. I think I've managed to lay down all the plot details now, so now hopefully things pick up.

But expect more cliffhangers. Sorry, that's just how this story-

Zackel/Rielle: _**GET ON WITH IT!!!!!!**_

Ack. Ingrates.


	15. Haunted

Chapter 15: Haunted

In the Plaguelands, Zackel had truly thought he'd seen the very antithesis of life.

Nothing natural remained in what had once been the proud Lordaeron kingdom. Streams ran with poison and foulness that had been purified multiple times to ensure safety if drunk (and most people didn't bother taking the risk). The ground either seethed with fel energies or dark toxins that produced frail, ghost-like versions of the plants and trees that had once grown there,. And whatever stalked, crawled, or shambled through its cursed regions was either dead, or something that should no longer be alive. Or should have never been given life. Or given life anew.

It was not the first time Zackel had been in a place that could be considered damned (he had traveled through Duskwood's black thickets a time or three, after all), but the Plaguelands had been the first time Zackel had felt he was looking at something that would never be right again. A place forever haunted by the choices, and mistakes, of its history.

As Zackel crept through the dark fortress that had become his home and prison, though, he realized that he'd been wrong. The antithesis of life could not only be said to be in a place as damaged as the Plaguelands. It could just as easily be said to be in this cast-off stone building, isolated and cut off by arcane magics (_HIS _arcane magics, but Zackel tried not to think about that fact) because the evidence of its previous normality was so much clearer than the Plaguelands.

And its rapidly disappearing absence was, in turn, felt so much keener.

Of course, there was that old expression about solutions, with the simplest answer usually being the correct one. Nearly all of the slipping normality of this cold citadel could be falling away solely due to Zackel's own mind, that was the simplest answer here. There was truth in that, and the phrase behind it…but Zackel found said truth to be rather fleeting when it was needed. And when concepts failed, feelings were often what remained to settle the issue.

There was another saying Zackel had heard once or twice, on the nature of bravery.

_Courage is the compliment of fear. A fearless man cannot be courageous. He is also a fool._

While a nice sentiment as well, its flaws became starkly apparent under pressure. For one thing, there were many kinds of fools, and Zackel was sure a fair bit of them had plenty of courage (hell, one type of courage was NAMED after fools). Another was just what fear did to the mind, and how it could render situations so that courage meant nothing, or came too late. Then there was the case of what courage and fear meant in the difference between a sudden situation, and one where you had the chance to think things through. Or more precisely in Zackel's case, _overthink _things.

"_**King fool you then…"**_

Zackel felt his mouth dry up as the voice slithered across his mind.

"…all right then." Zackel said to the empty hallway. Unlike last time, he was not carrying a torch: his sole light was the blue energy that glowed on the gem of his staff. "Let's consider possibilities here. Number one. Talking to me is all you can do."

That did not get him an answer, and Zackel did not expect one.

"I mean, if you could really DO something…why not attack us in our beds? Maybe I just need to realize that your tricks are few, and I've seen them all." Zackel said. "So…why would you not do that…"

Zackel held out a hand, placing it calmly on the cold stone wall. Without speaking, the only sound in the fortress was the faint howl of the storm outside, which rose and fell at various intervals.

"Do you feed on fear?" Zackel asked. "You will find us a poor meal then. Rielle only has the faintest traces of it left in her, and I'm quite sure it will never grow back. As for me…I'm a man of information. If I don't have enough, then I do grow afraid…but only long enough for me to seek more out. And if I don't find it then, then I draw a conclusion and let it stand. I've learned not to be indecisive…"

"_**Liarrrrrrrrrrrrr…"**_

"…right. If you're really not just something in my head, then prove it." Zackel said, swinging around. "Give me a sign that you're not just some unexpected consequence of my alchemy. Or that I'm not just losing my mind."

Again, silence was the sole response. Zackel slowly spun around again a few more times, before grimacing and rubbing his eyes.

"Because if I'm losing my mind…then the only one I have to worry about…"

The whisper was too faint for Zackel to make out words. He jerked up, yanking his staff out in front of him as the temperature around him dropped from his on-tenterhooks mystical power. Chewing on his lower lip to keep himself from bugging out, he turned around again.

"Fine. Let's say you're real. What are you trying to tell me? Hmmm? Random words, accusations? Again, that could just be me! Fel, how would YOU know what keeps me up at night? If you really knew what scared me, then why not try scaring Rielle? Why me? What's so great about me, huh? ANSWER ME!" Zackel hissed. His only response was the air being snorted furiously through his nostrils.

_Get a grip Zackel. You came down here to find some peace, not work yourself up even worse. Calm._

"Ghosts are not pure clones of what they were when they were alive." Zackel said, though he wasn't sure if he was thinking out loud or issuing a challenge. "Whatever made the person degenerates in the process, which is understandable considering that they DIED. Even if that person was a master of self-control in life, it is highly, HIGHLY unlikely that they could maintain that aspect of themselves. Ghosts are often driven to try and reclaim what they had when they were alive, which is why the spirits of people who were good and blessed by the light are often little different from truly malevolent ones. In close proximity to the living, they are driven to try and connect with them, a touch which is harmful to the living because they are being touched by an unnatural entity caught between their world and the next. Based on THAT, there is no possibility you would NOT attack the ogres, or, if you required humans, why you would NOT have attacked us by now. You simply would not be able to control yourself, and fel, I'm pretty sure I'm repeating MYSELF…"

"…_**what do YOU know?"**_

Zackel felt the familiar sick coldness creep through his veins.

"_**So little…so little…more…no…more…."**_

Zackel felt like someone had taken his stomach in their hands and begun twisting it into a knot. His teeth creaked inside his mouth, even as he lowered his staff and leaned his weight on it.

"…you…are still not…offering…the proof I desire…" Zackel said. "Are you…really…truly…there?"

Once again, no answer. Somehow, that was worse.

Zackel closed his eyes, feeling the shudder run up through his body and center on his head, the faint hot trace of a tear starting to run down his cheek.

_The heat of the fire all around them seemed to pale in significance from the heat of the blood all over his face. The screams continued in the flaming background of Stormwind, even as the terrible absence of screams of the one closest to Zackel raked nails across his soul, that pain fighting against the heart-crushing terror of the situation, the cruel fury in her eyes, the shine of pure malignant glee reflecting off the fangs in her mouth…_

"…I will not…repeat the past." Zackel whispered. "I will not isolate myself…and believe that there is no solution to my problems…outside of constant self-indulgence. I will not be found wanting again…when the time comes when I am needed. You made a decent effort, if you're even there, getting me to forget that, getting me down here, wandering around in the dark. But I'm not doing any more of your work for you. Either show your hand, or accept the fact you have no hand…except my own pained one." Zackel said, removing his right hand from his staff and trying to relax its tense, aching fingers. "And if it is just me…either present a solution, or up-end the table. You know very well, Zackel, that you hate half-assing anything."

The silence settled back onto Zackel, this time seemingly a touch less oppressive. Zackel took in another long, slow breath, trying to get the tension to flow out of his tense muscles.

"Accept nothing. Accept any thing. Decide on something, Wintersoul." Zackel said. "All right, first thing. Enough on the contemplation of my own navel. Seco-"

The skittering sound was about the worst thing that could have crossed Zackel's ears, and was akin to driving a dagger into his re-emerging hopes. Whispers and voices could be attributed to Zackel's own troubled mind, what his draenei companion reminded him of, and how long he had been forced to stay in one spot and think instead of constantly moving from place to place…

_Running away…_

Like any good adventurer did. Likewise, what had startled him from sleep some nights ago could also have just been his own mind, mixed with the noises all old buildings under constant storm bombardment made.

The brief, low scratching noise had none of that comforting vagueness. It was wholly an outside noise, made by an outside source.

One way or another, Zackel was not alone.

"…okay then." Zackel said, turning towards the sound. "Decided on something. Time to _do_ something."

That was the last sound Zackel himself made, as he began to walk as quietly and swiftly as he could towards the noise, pausing only to reach up and remove one of the unlit torches placed around the fortress. He lifted it to his mouth and, with a quick, silent breath and a spark of magic, ignited the end of the wood and held it out before him. The additional light revealed nothing new: that did not slow Zackel as he carefully crept around the corner. There was nothing in the hallway there, either.

Zackel scanned ahead, and then whirled around and shoved the torch into the room behind him. Shadows danced across the broken and rotting debris within, but said shadows produced the only movement. Zackel slowly crept in, staff in one hand and torch in the other.

With one swift jerk, he whirled and rammed the torch up towards the ceiling, aiming his staff up at the same time. All he saw was stone, nothing hovering above him waiting to pounce.

Instead, Zackel swore he felt something brush against his legs.

The mage yanked the torch down so fast he nearly set his own robes on fire, but once again nothing appeared, to gnaw off his ankle or offer him some tea. Zackel whirled around the room, each jerking shadow causing him to start before nothing substantial appeared to reinforce it. Snorting air through his nose still, he turned and stalked back out into the hallway, eyes darting back and forth.

He aimed his staff down one hallway, and the glow at the end of the weapon grew brighter. At the same time, Zackel hurled the torch down the other hallway, giving it a magic push to make it go further. It hit the floor just a touch short of the opposite wall: Zackel only gave the assessment that it had shown nothing in the hallway during its flight before he started down the one his staff was aimed at.

By the time he reached the end of the other hallway, having discovered nothing along the way, Zackel became vaguely aware that he was hyperventilating. He lowered his staff and tried to control his frantic, low breathing.

The flicker of movement in the corner of his eyes ruined his efforts.

Zackel's whirled staff again illuminated no threat or the source of what had gotten his attention. Breaking into a full sprint, Zackel ran down the hallway and thrust his staff around the corner again. Nothing. Zackel turned and stuck the staff into the nearby room, the same one with the hidden door. Still nothing, and the bookcase that he and Rielle had laid across the hidden passage did not look disturbed.

For a few seconds, Zackel considered pushing the bookcase aside and going back into the dark chamber. Maybe in there, the secrets and torments visited upon him would be solved…

Or maybe inside lay his horrific demise, leaving Rielle vulnerable…

Zackel planted the staff on the floor again and put a hand on his face, trying once more to calm his breathing. The ragged nature of his rising and falling chest was starting to bear the faint echo of a sob.

"…you…are…stronger than this." Zackel whispered. "You do not…answer…"

Maybe there was another clattering of noise down the hallway. Maybe Zackel just imagined it, as he jerked his eyes in its direction.

And felt the cold numbness wash up his arm, making his eyes widen even more. The faint crackling crunch that sounded down the hall confirmed it.

One of his traps had been set off.

Zackel drew one long, vicious breath in through his nose, and then seized his staff and stalked towards where he'd laid the trap. It had not triggered in his line of sight, and Zackel had heard no scream or cry to indicate something had been caught by it, but at this point, he was taking no chances. Cold energies swirled around his body, ice at the ready to protect or pulverize. Zackel pushed all the fears into the back of his head as he approached the corner, and practically leapt around it.

…to once again, find nothing.

Well, not precisely nothing. Several feet from him, the hallway was blocked off by over a dozen ice blades, all having stabbed into the hallway in a rough estimation of the usual center of mass most creatures had. They had caught no foe; the ice sat there unmarred by blood or broken by a flailing limb. The sprung trap was so fresh that Zackel could spell the strange sour tint it left in the immediate aftermath.

Zackel stared at it for seemingly an eternity, before he crept forward and reached out with a hand. The ice felt cold and smooth beneath his hand. The building pressure in his head began roaring to a peak, his mind creaking on its hinges.

_It's unstoppable. There's nothing you can do. It will run you ragged until you can't fight back and then it will have you. You are a toy, a pawn. Just like last time. Just…_

"Just…" Zackel said, spitting the word out like it had been a giant wad of glue in his mouth. "…But…doesn't this…work against it as much as for it? Because…I'd know it's there?"

The quiet night gave Zackel no response, as usual. Zackel planted his staff again and fully applied his nose to the grindstone this time, refusing to let anything distract him.

"…I…am capable…of setting off my own traps." Zackel said. He ran his tongue over his dry lips, and continued. "I thought I saw movement. I was getting worked up into a state of frenzied panic. There was no noise, no trace of the trap catching anything. There is no spirit I know of…that can completely ignore the effects of the arcane…if they want to stay in a form that can affect the world. I thought something was going this way…and I set off my own trap. That is a possibility."

Zackel opened his eyes, slowly turning around yet again.

"What is making the noise? Perhaps just a rat, a small number of vermin I only notice now because I'm hypersensitive. I do not actually know if something brushed my robes. This is all possibly still in my own head. No evidence, no _solid_ evidence, that it's anything else. Evidence still refuses to present itself. Evidence…is…lacking…?"

Zackel stopped, ears cocked. Whatever he was expecting, it did not happen.

"…things continue to suggest that I am doing this to myself. I re-iterate that I must stop. I know I am capable of it. I must act on that capacity." Zackel said, as he began to walk through the dark hallways again. After nearly ten minutes of doing so (during which Zackel retrieved the sputtering torch), he had found absolutely nothing else. No new sounds, no slight movements, no whispers from the dark corners of his mind, heart, or soul.

With that, his mind settled back down.

"…I think your best opportunity has passed." Zackel finally said, turning to head back to his triggered trap. The fact that it remained as it had been, minus the beginning stages of melting, reinforced Zackel's burgeoning decision. "I am done giving you any more power. If you want anything else…"

Zackel held out his hand, the ice breaking down into blue energy that flowed back into glowing runes on the wall.

"You'll have to come and take it." Zackel said. "Come get me in my sleep, if you dare. If you can even dare. Best hurry. I'm close to dismissing you entirely."

The very faint noise of Zackel's shoes on the stairs was all that answered Zackel's words. He quietly made his way up, pausing before he entered the room and checking to make sure he wasn't about to walk into a swung axe. As it turned out, Rielle was not lying in ambush. In fact, she hadn't even seemed to have woken up, as Zackel walked into the room and looked at her sleeping form.

"…must be nice…" Zackel said to himself, his voice nearly inaudible.

_**Is that what you think?**_

Zackel's eyes shot open once more, and despite all his efforts the panic came roaring back.

_**You're tortured by phantoms and possibilities. She sleeps like she's resting off a fine meal in an inn. Are you really so blind, mage? Are you fighting so hard to try and keep her from what you see, that you refuse to see that there might be truth in it?**_

Zackel's hand seized onto his hair as he shut his eyes tight. The images that flashed across his mind made him open them again, staring at Rielle's sleeping form.

_**Her side is easily faked. Her side is not matching. HER actions…why don't you look at THAT other side, Wintersoul?**_

_**Maybe it's in HER. Maybe it IS her.**_

"Can't be…"

_**You think that bored, ball-breaking interaction is kindness? She's made this so much harder than it had to be. Just like the other. You claim there's so much difference: is there really any, deep down? With all you're experiencing?**_

Zackel tried to swallow and found nothing to do so with.

_**She's taking away your peace of mind. She's taking away pieces of YOU. There's no solutions out there: the solution is in HERE. Solve it.**_

"You are nothing but late-night paranoia and old pain."

_**Are you really willing to stake your life for the sake of your denials? You vowed to face pain instead of letting it shackle you: it's time to do so. Solve it.**_

Zackel looked at Rielle's calmly sleeping form…

_**YOU KNOW WHAT HAPPENED WHEN YOU TRIED TO IGNORE ME! YOU RUINED HIS LIFE!**_

…and took a step towards it.

_**Don't let it happen again. Never will it happen, again.**_

Another step.

_**Make the hard decision. Cast it all away. Be free of it…**_

Zackel held out a hand, the fingers curling around Rielle's body from Zackel's perspective.

_**FACE THE PAIN.**_

Zackel clenched his fist.

And whirled around as he began hammering it against his own head, stalking towards a wall before he dropped his staff and began literally banging his face against the stone.

"I. Am. NOT THAT WEAK." Zackel snarled after several strikes, pulling his face away from the rock as he felt blood began to run down his forehead. "If you're something else, get a new line. And if you're me, that damn nagging dark voice given strength by all that's happened…I suggest you realize the gaping flaws in your argument. Because when it comes right down to it, I'm going to silence YOU before I do HER, no matter how much she may hurt me. You should know full well why. YOU SHOULD KNOW FULL WELL."

Once again, Zackel had no answer, and he slowly withdrew from the wall and sat down, feeling the blood run down his face.

"Accept nothing. Accept any thing. Sometimes when you want a simple answer, their grand advice is about as useful as a hole in the head. Especially when I'm driven to beat it in myself." Zackel said, feeling at the wound again. A drop of healing elixir would probably be best. Zackel pushed himself up from the floor, trying to make sense of the whole evening and whether or not there was an enemy…

Rielle's low groan nearly made him jump out of his skin.

"…Rielle?" Zackel said, looking at the sleeping alien, whose rest apparently wasn't peaceful any more. She'd curled up into a semi-fetal position, her hands tightly clenching the furs beneath her.

In retrospect, Zackel realized he really should have kept his distance, or at least been more careful in his approach.

At the time, all he thought was that his makeshift alcohol had had a completely unexpected reaction to the alien and that she was in pain, and he sprinted over to make sure she didn't suffer something like throwing up while she was still half-asleep and choking on her own vomit.

"Rielle!"

Zackel's touch made Rielle's eyes snap open. The expression there, and the way her body coiled like a snake, immediately told Zackel he had been wrong in his assessment. She wasn't in pain. She was in the grip of what seemed to have been a fierce nightmare.

And the actual world hadn't settled on her fast enough before she had her knife out and heading for Zackel.

The hot spatter of liquid on her face rammed the too-slow sense of reality home on the alien. She blinked, and then looked at what she had done.

Zackel, in turn, looked at the sheath of ice over his hand…and the knife point piercing right through it and the hand beyond, coming out the other end. He blinked, even as Rielle's eyes widened in horror from what she'd done.

"…ow." Zackel whimpered.

_The pain…_

_The blood…_

_The laughing, the damn __**LAUGHING…**_

Zackel promptly took another shot in his long-abused 'manhood', as his own eyes rolled up and he promptly fainted.

* * *

"You sure you're all right." Rielle said some time later.

"For the eighth time, yes. Healing potion did the trick." Zackel said, carefully flexing his now fixed appendage. He hadn't been out long, and he'd woken up to what he could have sworn was Rielle in a full-blown state of panic as she dug through his bags. Of course, once he'd groaned and sat up, and it had become clear that he wasn't about to keel over again and die, she'd come over and yelled at him for his messy bags. And then yelled at him for waking her up like that and getting his stupid ass stabbed. Then she'd yelled at him for not having his ice armor protect him, and when Zackel had pointed out she'd driven the dagger right through it she'd yelled at him for having weak ice. It was only after the retrieved tincture had closed up his wound and it was clear that he'd suffered no permanent damage that she'd issued an apology. Which had been followed by a few more.

"Let me see." Rielle said, kneeling down and taking Zackel's hand, pressing at several points with her fingers. "Intact…intact…knitted together and intact. And you don't deserve that, you _IDIOT_."

"Yes, I'm sure the point ending up in my throat would have been a far better result."

"YOU SHOULD HAVE BEEN MORE CAREFUL! You'd…I'd…" Rielle stammered.

"Yes Rielle. I know." Zackel said. "But…it didn't occur to me. You looked like you were hurt."

"I was just having a bad dream. Probably your stupid _weerkuay_ alcohol. You deserve a beating you stupid mage. Stupid…mage…" Rielle said, her eyes locking with Zackel's.

"Yeah…" Zackel replied, his voice trailing off. For a moment, Rielle's softly glowing eyes helped him forget that he'd nearly worked himself into a nervous breakdown and then gotten a dagger through his hand. So much nicer that there was no longer any fear in them. Fear did not suit them.

Fear…did not suit…

"…argh. Your breath! Blergh!" Rielle said, jerking away. "You did that on purpose!"

"What? Uh…um…hmmm." Zackel blinked, turning away a touch. "Breathed in your face? I didn't…huh. Subconscious revenge. Damn, my brain IS good."

"It'll look even better splattered on the ground, the next time you do something stupid like that!" Rielle said, stalking back over to her furs. "Get your stupid ass over here. I'm not sleeping with you across the room. If I have another bad dream your dumb ass will come over to help and I'll probably put my knife in that empty space between your ears that time. If you're over here with me maybe I'll have enough memory of you there to not slit your throat. Or maybe I'll have easier access. I haven't decided yet."

"………Not yet…" Zackel replied, turning away from Rielle. "I have to organize my alchemist materials. Maybe I'll brew some more stuff up while I'm at it. After that little bit of fun, I'm not exactly tired."

"…whatever. Suit yourself." Rielle said, curling back up on her bedding. "Stupid mage…thought you made me sick…should have stabbed your other hand for good measure…"

Rielle grew quiet after that, and left to his own thoughts, the full reality of the night settled back onto Zackel. Along the fact that he still didn't have any answers in regards to why.

How long he sat there, brewing things, Zackel wasn't sure. All he knew when he was done was that he probably had enough cleaning material and fermentation process liquid to last a month. None of it really helped to calm his mind. Or give him any solutions.

He'd stalked and run through the empty fortress. Rielle had had a nightmare so bad she'd come close to killing him. Coincidence? A side effect of his drinks? Something else? Something _bad?_

Eventually, though, even the cold stimulation of fear couldn't out-pace the need for rest. Maybe an answer would present itself in the morning.

Or maybe he'd never wake up at all, but Zackel doubted he'd be that lucky. Waking up to find something was already flossing with his guts was probably more likely, the way his fortune was going.

Normally, Zackel would have been careful when he walked over and laid down near Rielle to rest. This time, he was EXCEPTIONALLY careful.

Not two seconds after he'd fully gone prone, Rielle rolled over and semi-placed, semi-slammed her arm down on him.

Zackel tried to control his jerk of surprise. He didn't think he did a very good job.

"Huh…oh thereyur…" Rielle muttered sleepily. "Stayther, can keep tabs on your dumbazz…"

"…if you want." Zackel said.

"Heyzakkel…"

"…yes?"

"Whathappenedtoyurforehed…"

"…nothing Rielle. Just…go to sleep."

"Mmmmmgoodidea…sleep…" Rielle said. The quiet returned, followed by the slow, smooth breathing of rest from the draenei.

"…I fully expect to wake up to find this hand strangling me." Zackel said, and tried to sleep.

The only thing the hand did, in the end it seemed, was chase away any nightmares that sought out the mage that night.

Followed by repeatedly poking Zackel and demanding breakfast.

* * *

Writer's Note: Well, um…I did say that I was going to actually start revealing stuff…uh…this is your fault! I want more reviews! Yeah that's right! I look at my story traffic you know! Either you give me more reviews, or I swear the posting gaps and the filler will only INCREASE from here on-ARGH! *crashing noises*

Rielle: Oh look, it finally happened. The author finally got a big head and thought he was writing _Diplomacy_ or something.

Zackel: Did you have to beat him up and leave him tied up in his bathroom?

Rielle: It's for the best. We can write this! Finally actually GET somewhere, instead of all this dancing around!

Zackel: Better let me do it, I'm the mage.

Rielle: WHAT? What's THAT supposed to mean! You supercilious limp-wristed oblivious twit…!

Zackel: NO NOT IN THE FACE NOT IN THE FACE-ARGH!

*More crashes*

Jasciona: I don't know what this bodes to, but I doubt it's anything good.


	16. Running The Asylum

Chapter 16: Running The Asylum

Writer's Note: To later-coming readers, this chapter was originally supposed to be posted on April 1st. You have been warned.

* * *

To virtually any other, the assault would have come completely out of nowhere.

To Rielle, she had begun leaping backwards even before the sound of the knot in the wood exploding in the fire was done.

Searing teeth of flame surged out of the fireplace and crashed down where she had been, even as Rielle rolled to the side and pulled her axe from the wall. Despite herself, she grinned. It was about time.

"WHAT THE FEL-!" Zackel screamed, trying to rear up from where he'd been sitting and tangling himself up in the furs as he did so, causing him to promptly fall on his face again. Rielle spared him a quick glance before she looked back at the fire, even as it surged out anew and the dark figure stepped from the flames.

"Impossible! You cannot have known I was coming!" The orc warlock snarled. Clad in seething dark purple robes, runes of fel energy etched on the clothing and on the orc's face, the eyes of the creature burned with evil strength as fiercely as the skull-headed staff the warlock carried did.

"Oh please. After all that shit with spooky noises and nightmares? That was stupid enough of you, and I thank you for that. It's always good for orcs to be skilled in their _specialty."_ Rielle sneered. "But then you go and pull that little fire trick, whatever that is? You think I wouldn't notice an abrupt lessening of heat and the subtle way the air changed direction? When I'm RIGHT THERE, ADDING WOOD? Hah. There is no hour you can get up at that will put you ahead of me, orc. I don't know where you came from, why you were pulling all this hugga-mugga crap, or why that won't do any more…but I really don't care."

"You have NO IDEA what you trespass on, draenei vermin." The warlock retorted, raising a hand covered in burning green fire. "You will learn the hard way, as my masters feast on your flesh and soul!"

The fire blazed out, reforming on the ground into a vicious imp. The imp immediately began mirroring its master, summoning up its own fel blaze…

Until Rielle ran up and lashed out with her foot, kicking the imp through the air and straight into the warlock, knocking them both backwards into the fireplace with a bellow of rage from the orc. The imp began to protest, but its complaints about contract status quickly quieted as the warlock seized it and half-threw, half-smashed the demonic minion aside, sending it face first into the nearest wall, where it slid down with a groan.

"Rielle get your armor on!" Zackel said, running up to join the Draenei, staff at the ready.

"I don't need it. Not for an orc of THIS stripe." Rielle said, spinning her axe around, her stance mirroring her confidence, despite the fact that she _wasn't _wearing any of the heavy metal armor she'd used to battle in Wintergrasp and the ogres she'd found when the whole mess had begun. "Lucky for me that so many orcs are all of the same stripe. So much of the Horde, really. I hope they never change."

"SUFFER!" The warlock snarled, thrusting out a hand as a crystal shattered in his grip. Shadows pooled before him, the voidwalker surging up with a moaning snarl, embers of virulent incandescence igniting in its head. Zackel recoiled, his eyes wide with panic, and Rielle glanced at the mage for another brief second.

That was all the warlock needed to fire off a bolt of dark power, the attack striking Zackel in the chest and throwing him across the room with another cry. Rielle briefly rolled her eyes. Figured that the mage's old demons would ensure she'd have to deal with the current one solo.

"Alone again. Naturally." Rielle said, and charged.

The voidwalker surged to meet her, but the draenei swiftly eluded its despair-inducing claw and slashed out with her axe, cleaving through the voidwalker's side. It emitted its strange moaning wail even as it lashed out again, but Rielle once again slipped under its thrusting hand, whirling around it and hammering her axe down into its back. The creature shrieked, but it also tried to turn around and seize the alien warrior, whose rapid whirling dodges had now caused her to be pinned up against the wall. Another clawing blow cut off Rielle's escape and gorged several lines along the wall.

Rielle's only response was to give the voidwalker a rude gesture.

Evidentially, the demonic minion understood it, and sent both hands towards Rielle's throat. They never got close, as Rielle's weapon became a spinning blur and simultaneously knocked the voidwalker's hands away and slashed them up even more. The demon recoiled from the furious defense.

It proved to be it's final mistake. With speed beyond most comprehension, Rielle's axe was back into offensive position and slashing out, cleaving most of the voidwalker's head and upper body off. It thrashed about, and Rielle finished the job by spinning and bringing her axe down, slicing the creature straight down the middle and breaking it apart into motes of disintegrating shadow.

Zackel was not having as easy a time. An exchange of fire and ice bolts had ended with Zackel's magic incantations abruptly turning into horrific gibberish, or what he thought was such. Had Rielle heard it, she might have been chilled to the bone. However, by the time she approached, the warlock had followed up his curse with a lancing bolt of purple energy, stunning Zackel long enough for the warlock to begin sucking his life energy away, the process driving the mage to his knees.

"Hi there!" Rielle said with violent cheer as she stepped in front of the warlock and introduced her axe to his chest.

The imp had just about finished getting up when the warlock came crashing down onto it and crushed it beneath its form. Rielle almost felt sorry for the little creature.

"Glu-gah!" Zackel wheezed, as Rielle quickly zipped over to him.

"Get a grip, mage. Can't always carry you." Rielle said.

"Voidwalker…"

"I know." Rielle said, patting Zackel on the shoulder a brief moment before tightening her fingers and hauling him up. "Warlock was quick on the draw, too. But that uses up all your excuses. Move it or lose it."

Zackel snorted, and Rielle smiled slightly to herself as she felt the temperature drop. Zackel was, when it came down to it, a pretty good egg. He just needed some prodding and protection.

"Accursed-ARGH!" The warlock yelled as Zackel lanced out with a flying blade of ice that impaled through his body. "YOU WILL SUFFER ALL THE MORE FOR YOUR DEFIANCE, WEAKLINGS!"

"What exactly are we defying anyway?" Zackel asked.

"Beats me. There's an orc here, it wants to kill us, that's all I need." Rielle said, even as the warlock recovered. "Damn it. That fel armor of theirs is sometimes tougher than I recall."

The words the warlock spoke almost hurt Zackel's ears, as the orc produced another crystal and shattered it in his hand. The creature that emerged from the dark pit that formed almost hit the ceiling with its crimson armored protrusions, causing Zackel to take another step back. Rielle gave Zackel another glance, a slightly mocking grin on her face.

"Come on mage. I don't recall a felguard barging in on your love nest." Rielle said.

"So I am called to slay another failure, of the ones who could not see the glories of the Legion." The felguard said, pointing at Rielle with its hideous axe. "Come foolish _DRAENEI_, the power you rejected will…!"

Zackel never saw Rielle move. Neither did the Felguard. The Orc warlock saw a blur.

The Felguard split in half at the waist, not even having the time to let out a final cry. It's halves hit the ground around the same time as Zackel's jaw.

And Rielle wasn't done.

Though, due to the nature of her swing, Rielle could not bring the edge of the axe into the warlock's head as she continued her charge towards him. The flat of the weapon nearly did the job anyway, blood exploding from the orc's head as Rielle bludgeoned him with her weapon and sent the orc crashing into the wall. The warlock slid down into a limp, semi-boneless pile, and the draenei gave a dismissive snort, stepping back and lightly touching her forehead.

"Fel. If you're going to come out and expose yourself after all that sneaking around, you could have at least had the courtesy of being trouble enough to make me break a sweat." Rielle said. She was aware Zackel had approached her side again, and she turned her gaze once more to him, and the look he was giving her. "What?"

"Nothing…well, hardly." Zackel said, looking down at the felguard's remains and then back up at Rielle. "It's just…you're amazing. Really. Just…amazing."

Rielle's gaze softened a bit, and she nodded in reply.

That was when the orc tried to blast Rielle with his staff.

Rielle, unfortunately for the warlock, was not as slow as Zackel, as she dodged aside and lashed out with her hooved foot, smashing the orc back into the wall as she felt ribs snap beneath her blow.

"You call this glory? You call this STRENGTH?" Rielle hissed. "You have no CONCEPT of REAL strength. Hiding behind your masters, behind all those energies…and in the end, you have NOTHING. Why we fled from your worthless EXCREMENT of a race, only the light knows…!"

"But you do know draenei."

Rielle turned as Zackel's hand reached out and seized the alien by the throat.

Or rather, the malevolent blue aura that had settled _over _Zackel reached out and seized Rielle, lifting her off her feet. For the first time in a long time, Rielle was actually shocked into inaction.

The first thing she did was lock eyes with the mage, only to find that what she knew of Zackel Wintersoul was nowhere to be seen. Only a blazing hate remained, fueling an insidious fire that Rielle could feel burning on her throat.

In the corner of her vision, she saw the orc break apart and disintegrate.

"Because you know where your _STRENGTH _ends and POWER BEGINS."

_("What the FEL are you doing, you stupid mage!"_

"_Putting my foot down. I was willing to follow this resolution, but if you're going to play that way Rielle, I can too. Let's see how you like it when you get cast in the sideline role."_

"_When I get out of this ice, you are so dead!"_

"_Quiet. I'm writing now.")_

"Stupid creature." The entity possessing Zackel rasped in cruel merriment, even as acrid smoke began rising from its grip on Rielle's throat. "So easy to puppet. Pull the secrets from your mind, craft the enemy in a form that ignites your rancor, and cast your gaze to see it. And while you strike at shadows, I am free to strike at you."

Rielle's axe lashed out, only for another talon-clad hand of blue ether to catch the axe blade and stop it in its tracks.

"Pointless. Like all your efforts. By the time you even began to realize what crack in the world you'd fallen into, I'd already gleaned all your most important traits. Even my more overt probes didn't make you realize the true danger. Now it's too late." The entity said. "You have little use to me, alien. Mere raw materials. The true potential lies within the mind of the magician. And since I have already seized him…"

The entity swung his arm up, smashing Rielle into the ceiling before mirroring the strike and hammering her into the floor.

"You will be disposed of."

With a shriek of rage, Rielle sprang back up to her feet, axe at the ready.

"So defiant. No wonder they made the accusations they did." The entity said, raising an arm. "Well, if you intend to strike me down, do so. Just know it will take the life of the mage at the same time."

Rielle's eyes widened a touch before narrowing to slits, her knuckles turning white on her axe.

"But as you yourself have said, who needs anyone? Certainly not…"

Zackel's body spasmed, and the entity's words abruptly broke down into a yell. Then the synchronized motions of the phantasm emerging from Zackel and Zackel himself shattered, as Zackel dropped his staff and clutched at his head.

"What…no! This can't be happening! Not after my efforts!" The entity said. "You…"

"OUT OF MY HEAD!" Zackel yelled, pushing his hands out and trying to seize the entity. "Maybe you snuck up on me, jumped in and took over before I knew what was going on, but light be damned if YOU'RE STAYING IN HERE!"

"NO! YOU CANNOT-RARRRGGHHHHHH!" The entity shrieked, as it was literally ripped off Zackel's form, the mage staggering backwards as it occurred. The blue malignant energy pulsed before reforming into a spiked, clawed humanoid spirit.

"You think so little of me. You're not the first." Zackel said, wiping blood from his nose. "But if you think I'm just going to fall to my knees and submit, YOU HAVE ANOTHER THING COMING!"

"This means-!" The entity yelled, before Rielle's axe went tearing through it's form. It emitted a cry of pain and rage that drilled into Zackel's ears, but the attack did not prove as effective as Rielle's efforts against the false voidwalker had been. The entity turned around, facing the draenei warrior, pure fury burning in her gaze as she attacked again.

"Rielle, wait! It's not…!" Zackel yelled, but the draenei was beyond any state where she could have listened, instead lashing out with repeated blows at the entity. The assault went right through the strange malignancy, every single swing, and while it did not ignore the strikes, their effects seemed to be minimal at best. Zackel watched for a few seconds before he scooped up his staff, trying to, and just managing, to skirt around the pair. Normally he would have attacked, but after watching Rielle's attempts, he had no idea if anything he did wouldn't just go through the creature and strike her instead. Instead, he tried to carefully join Rielle at her side.

He wasn't careful enough.

"Rielle…!" Zackel said, before Rielle swung her axe backwards and nearly took Zackel's head clean off. Zackel's frantic stumble-dodge finally caught the draenei's attention, and she swung her head around to look at the mage…

The entity's hand swung out, seizing Rielle and spinning to the side, the creature smashing the warrior into the wall with a thunderous crack. With one quick follow-up whirl, the entity turned, Rielle still in its grip, and hurled her across the room, the draenei hitting the wall opposite of where Zackel was with another sickening noise.  
"NO!" Zackel yelled, raising his hand and firing out a spray of ice blades. His worry proved true, as the ice blades ended up being as effective as Rielle's axe. The creature quickly swung around, nearly backhanding Zackel into next week.

"As I said. This means nothing." The entity said. "I've waited too long to be defied by the pathetic amount of resistence you can muster. Waiting for something with suitable power to come along, so I could be reborn into this wretched world and all its delicious multitudes. You're a poor choice, but I'll take it. No matter what either of you has to say." The entity said, turning back towards Rielle, who was trying to get to her feet. "Not like it's a new story. It always has the same ending, warrior. What they said, what they thought, what you decided…it all means nothing. Nothing before _POWER._ In power, all things are merely there for the powerful…"

The temperature's slow dropping was lost on the creature. The error of such an oversight suddenly became clear when ice began to form on its body.

"What's this?" The entity said, turning back towards Zackel, who was not as knocked-senselessly as it had appeared. He was back on his feet, arms out, misty blue energies surging from his form and into the entity's own, causing the ice on its body to grew. "What are you trying to do? Make me freeze to death? I AM BEYOND DEATH FOOL."

"Maybe. Enough for my companion's efforts to be less effective than they normally would." Zackel said. "But…I know a thing or two about power too, whatever the hell you are. I know that if you want to carry out whatever sick plan you've been festering away in here for who knows how long putting together, you need to have a form that can interact with this world to carry it out. As you are, the advantage is yours, and maybe if you'd just tried to kill us, I'd be helpless. But you screwed up. You went inside me. Tried to form a link. And with that link…I'm going to balance the scales. Give you a more properly 'firm and here' form, SO WE CAN HAVE IT OUT PROPERLY."

"What…no!" The entity snarled, as it realized that that was exactly what Zackel was doing. The mage was somehow using its ice to make the entity manifest into a more physical state. As it was, it could ignore the draenei's blows. If Zackel poured more power into his transfer… "YOU WILL NOT SUCCEED! YOU ARE WEAK! JUST LIKE HER! CAST IN DIFFERENT SHADES, BUT BOTH PATHETIC AT THE CORE!"

"Says you." Zackel said.

The entity lashed out, smashing its hands into Zackel's body. Zackel stumbled back, his robes tearing beneath the entity's assault, but he kept up his own, more and more ice forming on the form of the creature. The entity tried to escape by forcing its way into Zackel's body and mind again, only to find that the strength Zackel had mustered to kick it out was still intense enough to KEEP it out.

"NO! YOU CANNOT DEFY ME!"

"Watch…me…" Zackel rasped through bloody lips. "Won't…fail again…"

"DIE!" The entity yelled, smashing Zackel with a blow so potent the mage was nearly turned inside out, Zackel flying through the air and crashing down onto the stone floor. The entity surged forward to continue, only to find Zackel holding up a hand from the ground, the ice almost fully covering its spectral form.

"Should…mind…" Zackel whispered. "Surroundings…"

The entity did not have eyes to blink. Instead, it just turned around.

Rielle's axe came down a second…

_("OH NO YOU DON'T!"_

"_Ack! What are you doing Rielle! I had it all wrapping up nice-!"_

"_Yeah, with me as the dumb muscle who doesn't know her ass from her elbow while you play the tortured atoner who's going to make good and look good in the process! Give me the writing…instrument…thing! I'll finish this!"_

"_No darn it, we don't have to fight over this, we started this to wrap it up, we can't…!"_

"_Ack! Watch it!"_

"_What?"_

"_NO YOU TWIT DON'T TURN THAT…!"_

_**CRASH!**_

"…_okay Mr. Smarty-Mage, what do all those colors coming out of the writing thing mean?"_

"_I think it means we better try and gather them up before…"_

"_Too late."_

_**WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOSHHHHHHHHH.)

* * *

**_

"Forget the power of technology and science, for so much has been forgotten, never to be re-learned." Rielle said, her massive powered armor creaking as she moved. "There is no peace amongst the stars, only an eternity of carnage and slaughter, and the laughter of thirsting gods."

Zackel's only response was to raise his shuriken gun and kick the igniter on his jet bike.

"Forget the promise of progress and understanding…" Rielle said, as she watched the endless crashing hordes of green approach. "Here, in the grim darkness of the far future, THERE IS ONLY WAR."

"…why so I have the feeling we got confused somewhere?" Zackel said to no one in particular. "Oh well. THE EMPEROR PROTECTS!"

"WARRRRRRRRRGGGGHHHHHHHH!" The destroying legions bellowed back.

"…wait, I think I got my battle cry wrong too."

**88888**

"RRRAAAUUUGGGHHHHHH!" Deathbringer Saurfang roared, his axe smashing the gnome death knight and female paladin aside like they weighed nothing. "Is this the best the living can present me? Your doom is even more assured than I believed!"

Blasts of arcane and holy power slammed into Saurfang, but he barely seemed to notice, turning towards the human mage and dwarf paladin and making them collapse in agony with a gesture. While priests frantically tried to counter-act the boiling blood within their forms, Saurfang whirled around, seized a rogue by the head, and hurled him off the spire with a cry. A massive bear pounced on Saurfang next, only for Saurfang to ignore its claws and seize it in turn, smashing it into the ground and kicking it across the spire.

"Worthless! ALL WORTHLESS!" Saurfang thundered, his eyes flickering to his next target. "COME! MY MASTER DEMANDS MORE BLOOD!"

"I'll drown him in yours." Rielle replied, bringing her axe up as she charged. Saurfang swung his own back, and the two met in a gigantic eruption of strength and fury.

**88888**

"Why hello! I'm Rielle Draeneisdonthavelastnames, from the popular but not as popular as _Diplomacy _WOW fanfic, _Cold Comfort Castle!"_ Rielle said.

"And I'm standing next to her!" Zackel said in an odd tone.

"You know, the world of professional sports has seen some very unsportsmanlike conduct recently." Rielle said. "Drug use is rampart, player salaries are obscene…"

"And tennis is still boring!"

"That's why the world needs a new form of athletic entertainment! One that's not only fun and exciting, but appropriate for adults and children!"

"And inappropriate for everyone else!"

"Of course, I'm talking about the sport that's sweeping Azeroth! The sport known as…GNOMEBALL."

"It's fun, because you get to use a hammer!"

"And wholesome because you get to hit gnomes with them!"

"Over and over again!"

"Heh heh. Exactly."

**88888**

"So, let's review." Jim Raynor said, standing on the bridge of a starship. "The situation as it stands now: Kerrigan is the Brood Queen. We Terrans and you Protoss are scattered to the four winds. You found out that the Xel Naga, who invented you and the Zerg, are moving back in to join our little fracas."

"That is correct." Zeratul said.

"And it doesn't strike you as strange that we've been sitting around with no alteration to this status quo for _TEN YEARS?_"

"It is truly an abnormal situation. Where the blame lies, even I cannot say." Zeratul said. "However, I believe our situation could be worse."

"How?"

The alien waved a hand, and on a nearby view screen, Rielle and Zackel appeared, both of them looking at what appeared to be a human woman, if said human woman had been forcibly combined with a scorpion and a corpse.

"Yeah, definitely think we'll need more than three here." Rielle said. "What say you, Zackel? Seven or twenty-three?"

"I AM THE QUEEN OF BLADES, MISTRESS OF THE ZERG, AND THE MOST POWERFUL BEING IN THIS QUADRANT!" Kerrigan bellowed.

"Really leaning towards twenty-three." Zackel said.

"Blasted usurpers! I am not worth experience! I do not drop purples! I do not have mechanics to study or achievements to grant! Accursed overlords! Three expansions to this secondary realm and we don't even get a lazy handheld port or something!"

"Hey, what can you say?" Zackel said, primping. "The love goes where it goes."

"…Tarrasque, deal with them."

The gigantic clawed monster the size of larger dinosaurs ripped itself out of the ground, shrieking as the mage and warrior took a step back.

"…yeah. Definitely twenty-three." Rielle said.

"Maybe thirty-eight."

"Let's go start those recruitment efforts." Rielle finished, and the two turned and ran, the alien monster snapping at their heels.

"Well I suppose it could have been worse." Kerrigan groused. "They could have forgotten about us entirely after Ghost was canceled."

**88888**

"So…what do you think it means?"

"Well, let's review." Rielle said, looking up at the gigantic shape in the sky. "There's a small moon floating above the Exodar. It just made a new volcano by shooting CHAINS THE SIZE OF RIVERS into the ground. And lest we forget, the Naaru have DISAPPEARED. You know what I think? I think it's the end of the _weerkuay_ world."

"Again?"

"Oh come now Sparse." Rielle said, turning to look at the mage. "Say it like you mean it."

**88888**

"_Hey Marshall, what gives?"_

"_What Quinn?"_

"_Why are you playing Zackel as so damn oblivious? Rielle's been sending him signals that could probably be seen from space."_

"_True, true, but we have yet to find out some final crucial details about Zackel. If we tipped our hands too early, realistically all we might get is some PWP. I think the way I've crafted this, we'll end up with something else…"_

"_Something ELSE, Marshall? You know what the other players think about your something elses."_

"_What can I say, Quinn? Aren't all great love stories tragedies?"_

**88888**_  
_

"_**DEATH IS MY CALLING…"**_

The long chain swung the axe down, cleaving the centaur in half in a shower of gore.

"_**VIOLENCE MY CREED…"**_

Unfathomably powerful fingers tore the head off the blood elf, its namesake splattering on Rielle's chalk-white skin.

"_**I WILL WASH AWAY THE PAST…WITH THE BLOOD OF THE TITANS…"**_

Armies of mechanoids advanced to confront Rielle. Her only response was a sneer.

"_**CHAOS…WILL RISE AGAIN."**_

Blood. Destruction. The rending of flesh. The tearing of bone. All driven by a wrath beyond comprehension.

"_**AND IN THE END…THERE WILL BE-ONLY-CHAOS!"**_

And on top a mountain of corpses, twin axes dangling from chains on her wrists, Rielle looked up and shrieked.

_**"SARGERASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!"**_

There was a pause, and then a sweaty-faced Zackel pulled himself up next to Rielle, having finally climbed the heap of bodies.

"…you know, that cry of sworn vengeance kind of loses something when it's a name with more than two syllables."

**88888**

"Ahhhhhhhh…another beautiful day in the lands of my empire, Northrend." Arthas said as he sat on the Frozen Throne. "A perfect time to go out and spread more terror."

"Good MORRRNNNING Arthas." Kel'Thuzad said as he floated in.

"If it isn't my most loyal servant Kel'Thuzad. How goes it?"

"I made your favorite. FROZEN SCONES!"

"Oh boy! Frozen scones! That just happens to be the snack which I have the most delight in snacking upon!"

"How's the frozen scones Arthas?" Lady Deathwhisper asked.

"These frozen scones are delicious. Now, how goes the war efforts?"

"The war efforts are going wonderful my liege. In fact we have all sorts of amazing weapons and armor stored in our giant 'nice things' vault."

"Splendid!"

"Uh! Arthas! Arthas!" Professor Putricide said as he ran in.

"This better be important because I am trying to enjoy my tea." The Lich King said.

"Th-there are adventurers in the Citadel!"

Arthas' tea sprayed into the air from his spit-take of surprise, the liquid instantly freezing and falling to the ground.

"PSHHTT! ADVENTURERS IN THE CITADEL? AH SHI-LIGHT DAMN-FUC-PISS! NETHERSPIT! WHAT ARE THEY DOING IN HERE? YOU KEPT THEM OUT FOR OVER A YEAR, WHAT DID THE GUARD GO FOR A…OH LIGHT DAMN IT!" Arthas cursed. "Kel'Thuzad! Kel'Thuzad! Unlock all the doors! I can't have the ASS-VENTURERS break any more of them! You see what they did to the Black Temple, just blew a hole in the side, ruined the ambience! Oh light-shi-Open the nice things vault! Tell my minions to hide all the items on their person! KLEPTOMANIACS KEEP STEALING ALL MY STUFF!"

"Arthas! The adventurers just took out Lord Marrowgar!" Kel'Thuzad said.

"STUPID USELESS ASS MARROWGAR! I GO TO ALL THE TROUBLE TO CRAFT HIM, AND WILL HE LISTEN TO ME TO STOP YELLING BONE STOR-YOU KNOW WHAT, HE JUST LOST HIS BOSS STATUS! He's now a normal-ass enemy! Like all those Damned!"

"Uh Saurfang, Putricide, and Lana'thel are gone too."

"What? OH LIGHT DAMMIT! LIGHT DAMMIT! L-L-Lana'thel LIGHT DAMMIT! **LIGHT DAMMIT! **Lana'th-_**LIGHT DAMMMMIITTTT!**_ You know I kind of liked Lana'thel too. Stupid ASS!"

"Don't worry Arthas, I'll take care of-oh oh wait, they brought Fordring!" Kel'Thuzad said in the next room. "Uh uh he's got me in a headlock! And uh he's using the Ashbringer and uh uh, sup I'm dead again."

"What? ALREADY? LIGHT DAMN IT! All right, okay Arthas, you didn't sit frozen in ice all the time to not learn any moves. I got Frostmourne, yeah, yeah, and lots of Scourge, yeah, and I got all sorts of ways to kill life, I can do this. Yeah, yeah. I'll just stay here, on my throne, and kick their asses myself. Yeah, yeah, maybe the adventurers are off their game, and they'll only die once. Yeah, okay, sitting down, waiting…"

…

"DIE MONSTER! YOU DON'T BELONG IN THIS WORLD." Fordring declared.

"IT WAS NOT BY MY HAND THAT I WAS…wait what is this, this is completely wrong. All of it." Arthas said. "Really, cut the crap, Fordring. What are you doing here? I kept you all locked out firmly for months and months, and now suddenly you just walk inside? I mean, I was really looking forward to this day, and now you and I think I counted twenty-five other douche bags are here to kill me, and I just woke up, not five minutes ago-"

"TRIBUTE? YOU STEAL MEN'S SOULS, AND MAKE THEM YOUR SLAVES!"

"What? What the fel, Fordring, I didn't even say the word tribute and…"

"YOUR WORDS ARE AS EMPTY AS YOUR SOUL! MANKIND ILL NEEDS A SAVIOR SUCH AS YOU!"

"I KNOW, THEY KNOW, THEY KNOW EXACTLY WHAT YOU'RE GONNA SAY, you're just blindly following the script aren't you, this was a stupid parody, fine, gotta keep going, fine, lemme get this wine glass real quick…"

…

"WHAT IS A MAN? A MISERABLE LITTLE PILE OF-BULLLLLLLLSHIT, I'M DONE!"

…

"HYDRO STORM!"

"OH SHUT UP!"

**88888**

"You shouldn't have rejected me, Zackel." Jasciona said, as Rielle pounded furiously on the sphere of fire she was trapped in. "Now more than you have to pay."

"If you've fallen this far, Jasciona, then you've already lost." Zackel replied. Jasciona narrowed her eyes, even as the Night Elf Sentinels formed up around her.

"You want to fight me? You're not the brightest." Jasciona said.

"You won't know what hit you! IN THE SLIGHTEST!" Zackel yelled, abruptly posing with the gnomes that had appeared around him, all of them thrusting their arms into the sky at an angle.

"Fire ball girls! Take this sucker out!" Jasciona said, leaping into the air as she and all the night elves threw fireballs.

"Let me tell you what it's all about!" Zackel replied, as he and the gnomes stood their ground. "You and your fire balls, and your purple night elf chicks! You're talking the talk and it's all pretty slick!"

Zackel and the gnomes crossed their arms in front of themselves, and an ice shield appeared around them, the fireballs snuffing out on it.

"You think you're so great, but you're missing the point." Zackel said, pointing at Jasciona, his fingers in a gun shape. "You gotta have friendship, and courage, and whatever!"

"That doesn't even RHYME!" Jasciona yelled as she landed.

"Shut up!" Zackel retorted, and froze Jasciona's feet to the ground with a gesture. When she tried to blast him, he encased her hands in ice in turn.

"No! I lost! How can this be!" Jasciona said.

"Open up your eyes…!" Zackel yelled, charging in and swinging his staff. "MAYBE-YOU'LL-_SEE!"_

Zackel swung a home-run blow right into Jasciona, as she was thrown into the air.

Then, in a very strange occurrence, she stopped in mid-air with a stunned look on her face, and abruptly turned into money. Zackel watched the coins clatter to the ground.

"…okay. And I thought the time I found that crossbow on that spider was inexplicable."

**88888**

**THE WORLD BELIEVES THAT THEIR ENCROACHING DOOM LIES IN THE FROZEN NORTH.**

**THE DARKNESS BELIEVES THAT THE POWER SLEEPING BENEATH THE PLANET WILL SOON ERUPT AND FINALLY CLAIM IT ALL, WITH ITS CORRUPTED CHAMPION OF SCORCHING METAL AND RAGE.**

**THE CRAFTERS BELIEVE THEIR REALMS ALONE, THEIR WORK SO UNIQUE.**

**SOON, THEY WILL ALL BE PROVEN WRONG.**

**SOON, THEIR WORK WILL BE EXPOSED AS THE MINUTAE IT IS.**

**SOON, THERE WILL BE A WAR IN HEAVEN. AND THE WORLD WILL BURN TO ASH DESPITE ALL THOSE WHO WISH TO CLAIM IT.**

**IT COMES.**

_**VAE VICTUS.**_

**88888**_**  
**_

Zackel: A-one-two-three…

_I'M THE WORLD'S GREATEST FROSTMAGE_

_THAT THE WORLD HAS NEVER HEARD 'A_

_YOU'D THINK THAT WOULD BE STRANGE_

_BUT I'D SAY HOGGER IS ABSURDER_

_See the world was pretty good until Sarg changed his name to Surt_

_Then Azeroth became No 1 in being a world of hurt!_

_Since then everything has pretty much gone straight in the ditch_

_First Illdian's shirtless ass, now the king of the Lich._

_Name's Zackel Wintersoul and check the first review_

_I'm gonna save the world, Kirby says I'm not a Sue!_

Arthas_: I'd like to inform you what my wrath is want to do._

_Your lands are the ass and this sword is-MY SHOE!_

_I'M NEXT UP IN THE QUE_

_EVERY ONE OF YOU IS THROUGH_

_(_Zackel_: Wrong.)_

Arthas_: HA HA HA HA!_

_(And you smell like poo)_

Zackel_: Sure Arthas! Not like I got shit to do!_

_Might as well spend all my time locking horns _

_With you and your crew!_

_C'mon Jazzy there's no Titans to deal with this clash!_

_Let's go make Arthas mourn the frost we shove up his ass!

* * *

_

"Hey! Zackel!"

Zackel blinked his eyes open at the voice and the poking hand.

"I want breakfast. And it needs muffins. Go make some muffins." Rielle said.

"Huh? Oh." Zackel said, rubbing his eyes. "Sure, sure. One second."

"Something wrong?"

"Oh no. Just…weird dreams."

* * *

Writer's Note: I apologize for my characters thinking they could tell the story better and instead turning the story into a sugah-high crackfic. This is why fictional characters shouldn't muck with stuff that crafts their existence. Just be glad I axed my way out of the bathroom before the REST of that Mega Man 2 rap parody/ripoff got posted. I think it would have taxed your patience beyond the breaking point…

You're all glaring at me. You want plot resolutions. Yes, I know.

Next chapter. Really. The situation is about to transpire that will bring all secrets to light.

In the words of the Cryptkeeper, I call it…

_IN VINO VERITAS_


	17. In Vino Veritas

Chapter 17: In Vino Veritas

**Writer's Note**: If anyone wants a breakdown of the parodies done last chapter, head over to my forum. And while you're at it, post there. Yes, I am quite shameless, why do you ask?

"Zackel?"

"Yeah?" The mage said, looking up from his Thrust stone. It had been another quiet day, and Zackel had done his best to push his concerns to the back of his mind. With nightfall had come the pair's usual Thrust game by the fire, with Rielle having learned and adapted enough to the game that Zackel actually had to think his moves out now. He'd been doing just that when the draenei had spoken.

"Why _did_ you arrange a trigger for a blizzard? Wait wait, I know it was for cover in case things went tits-up for you, which they did, big surprise…"

"Point. Please. Now." Zackel said, twirling the stone in his fingers.

"I mean, why did you have a technique like that to begin with? Triggering a storm? It doesn't exactly strike me as anything but a big waste of magical power. Especially since you're not good enough to stop it, despite your efforts. Also the fact you said that an outside mage could potentially stop it as well."

"Yes."

"So…explain?"

"Well, the answer's pretty simple if you're in certain fields like arcane magic. Considering your particular skill set, it's understandable why you never heard of it." Zackel said. "Tell me Rielle, how cold does it get in Northrend?"

"You mean in terms of I felt like someone welded bits of metal to my breasts most of the time, or in terms of 'You wander off at the wrong time and stay out of sight for ten seconds, you're most likely dead'?"

"Well, both. The latter moreso, though, Rielle." Zackel said, as he put the stone down. "The Lich King's armies are nasty enough as it is. Most Scourge creatures feel neither pain nor fear, and often have poisonous bodies that can kill you even if you hack them to bits. But when the call went out that the Alliance and Horde were taking the fight to Northrend, the magicians of the world quickly realized something else. Scourge creatures, most of the time, literally can't freeze to death. Oh yes, you can encase them in ice and shatter them, or do something more subtle like make the water in their bodies expand via freezing, which leads to near-complete cellular destruction but is troublesome to do, to say the least…but the traditional way of exposure? It doesn't work. They just freeze solid and lay dormant until someone thaws them out, and then they're back 'to work' without any loss of effectiveness. And Arthas has been sitting up on Northrend attuning himself to it for so long, the whole continent, as you yourself told me, feels like an extension of his will. Just landing the armies and champions of the Light on Northrend would be foolhardy. All it would take would be one giant storm over a battlefield, and the Scourge would not only win, they'd have greatly bolstered their ranks from all the unfortunately warm-blooded creatures who froze to death. And the Lich King is capable of summoning such a storm. It would be, I suspect, the least he could do."

"So…you try and stop him by…summoning the storms yourselves?"

"Not quite Rielle." Zackel said, before sipping from his canteen, which contained his makeshift alcohol mix. Zackel had dubbed it PT, for 'Passing Time', and having spent some time tweaking it, he was fairly confident it would not make any demons inside his head worse. If the demons were actually OUTSIDE his head, well…he'd have to think of another solution. "The mages of the Kirin Tor, and the rest of us, decided we had to make sure that Arthas couldn't turn the weather against us to that degree. We would have to learn counter-magic, both on a massive and on a 'on the spot' scale. That way, not only could they have mages devoted fully to the tasks of jamming Arthas' attempts to kill us with the weather, but they could have every mage ready to lend a hand if they desperately needed to re-direct a storm, or throw more muscle behind an attempt if one of Arthas' lieutenants, like Kel'Thuzad, made a personal effort to try to make such a blizzard…"

"Kel'Thuzad's dead. Horde killed him." Rielle said, her tone becoming bitterly annoyed.

"You mean like how he was supposedly killed in the Plaguelands?"

"Not this time. Argent Dawn saw to it personally that afterwards, there were no loose ends."

"Ah…well, good for them, I suppose."

"Speak for yourself."

"Getting back to my point." Zackel said. "The best way in magic is to teach how to build before you break down. So all mages began to be trained in methods to cast their frost talents on a grand scale, hence starting a blizzard. Once they'd learned that, they would then learn the counter-magics to STOP one."

"And _you _hadn't learned the counter-magics yet." Rielle said in a teasing tone.

"To be fair, when I was being taught as an apprentice mage, everyone had virtually forgotten about Northrend and Arthas. It was all about Ragnaros and the Shifting Sands and all that, and then the Dark Portal. By the time they started teaching such anti-blizzard spells to all magic students, I was out of training. I had to pick it up as I went along, from my peers and anyone else I ran into who could teach me."

"And you did a pissssss-poor job." Rielle said, drawing out the word purposely before she lightly flicked Zackel in the forehead.

"Ha ha. Yeah, it turned out that way. But that's hardly my fault, Rielle. The erstwhile defense that trapped us here, it was part of the training I was giving myself. To get better at it, and start on the counter-spells. It's not like I would have gone to Northrend with my skills at their current level." Zackel said. "Magic's not like one of your combat routines, Rielle. There's always variance, always issues. The mages of the Kirin Tor knew that above everything else. Why do you think they moved Dalaran above Northrend?"

"To show off?"

"Maybe, yes. But it served two primary purposes. One, it's a neutral base for Alliance and Horde…"

"Regretfully."

"And two, it's the primary focus of the spell-jamming efforts against Arthas. From what I've heard, they've got no less then twenty-eight mages up there devoted entirely to blocking Arthas' efforts. It's also why Dalaran's floating in the air, instead of on the ground. Not only is it easier to defend that way, but it's right up close to the atmosphere that needs to be manipulated, or re-manipulated, or whatnot."

"And the rest of you mages around Northrend shore up the sidelines."

"Precisely."

"And you couldn't do something like freeze the Horde out of Wintergrasp with a directed storm."

"…I'm not there, Rielle. I don't know why they do things." Zackel said. "I can venture a guess, though. They're purposely remaining neutral."

"Neutral?! Do you know how much manpower and effort is being wasted because the thrice-damned Horde keep trying to seize the Wintergrasp Mines?!"

"That's regretful, I'll admit. Especially since they were opposing you." Zackel said, his tone serious up until that point. "Really, I'd hate to have seen what those Horde people might have done to you, if you weren't, you know, YOU, the all mighty and powerful and ferocious and unstoppable warrior…"

"You left out hot!' Rielle said, giving Zackel another smack.

"Fine. Hot too. Absolutely smoking. I would be drooling a river over your looks and body if my sheer terror of you didn't leave my mouth dry."

"Perv." Rielle said, (very lightly) backhanding Zackel. "I need to step up my beatings of you. Maybe swell your eyes shut so I don't feel them ogling me all the time."

Zackel opened his mouth to retort that it was half the time at most, and then stopped at the flirting insult made him feel strangely ill.

_Not so strange mage…_

"Keeping your trap shut. You're learning well, squishy." Rielle said, and placed her Thrust stone down. "And I believe I win."

Zackel regarded the board for some time, then picked up a stone and placed it down.

Several moves later, he muttered a resignation. She had indeed out-maneuvered him.

"You should feel proud mage, making something as awesome as me even more…breathtaking, in all aspects."

"More like gagging."

"YOU WANT GAGGING!?" Rielle said, and pounced on Zackel, the two briefly rolling around before she got him in an arm lock.

"Say it! Say it!"

"Okay, okay…YOU CHEAT!" Zackel said, and semi-twisted out of Rielle's grip and tried to reverse it. To his own semi-surprise, he actually managed to.

"Savor this moment, mage." Rielle said, glancing over her shoulder. "I'm going to make you regret it all the more in about three seconds."

"Or we could, you know, stop fighting before we accidentally kick the Thrust board into the fire or something."

A few seconds later, Zackel was flat on his face regretting that his attempted psychology hadn't worked. Rielle walked over to the Thrust board and carefully placed it aside, and then walked back over and slammed herself back down on a rising Zackel.

"Maybe it's about time I started teaching you the _REAL_ dangerous holds." Rielle said, pressing her forearm into Zackel's throat.

"CAN WE…POSSIBLY DO IT TOMORROW?" Zackel rasped.

"…nah." Rielle said, and spent a few more minutes tying Zackel up in knots.

* * *

Journal Entry No # 451

_I do moan and groan, but I actually have begun to like these sessions with Rielle. For all her semi-bullying, she has astonishing control of herself, and I actually think I've learned a thing or three struggling with her. As much as she herself complains, I think she's come to like staying here. We're both learning from each other…_

_There is often so little time in this crazy world of ours to stop and think…and observe…_

_Of course, Rielle's patience with me is probably helped by the fact that I'm pretty sure the storm will end soon, and have told her so._

_Until then, we keep trying to get to know each other._

…_I'm not sure where to stop that.

* * *

_

"Come ON Zackel. If you're going to throw ice at me, at least make me TRY." Rielle complained, her axe at the ready. Zackel's only response was to rub his hand beneath his nose with an annoyed snort.

Rielle whirled around and knocked the ice out of the air as it fired behind her. A second later, she thrust her axe behind her back and blocked the follow up ice ball Zackel had thrown at her. She spun back around, smirking at the mage's semi-astonished look.

"Not good enough, Zack. Your eyes betray where you strike. And your heart betrays how you would follow." Rielle said. "Here, let me help you. Stop me mage, or I'll _KILL YOU."_

Zackel's eyes widened, and that was all Rielle needed to charge forward, grab Zackel with one hand, slam him against the wall, and then smash him into the floor. No sooner had she done that then she had her axe in both hands and was swinging it up.

The floor iced up beneath her. Rielle expected that.

She did NOT expect the ice to form so fast that it literally bulged up and shifted her feet beneath her, throwing off her balance. One kick to the legs later, courtesy of Zackel, and Rielle found herself crashing to the ground. Half a second later, the mage was on top of her, an ice dagger at her throat.

"And I believe the phrase here is, 'you're dead.'" Zackel said, poking Rielle in the throat. Rielle's reaction of surprise faded almost instantly, her face becoming a mask of stone.

Once again, Zackel really had no idea what happened to him. The next thing he knew, Rielle was now on top of HIM, holding his ice dagger at HIS throat.

"Too slow." Rielle said, giving Zackel a firm jab in the Adam's apple. "But not too bad, mage. Not good enough though."

"Really." Zackel said, as his eyes glowed. The ice manifested even quicker than Rielle's reaction speed, lancing up through her hand and stopping just short of her own throat. Rielle blinked, before giving Zackel a slight grin and putting the ice dagger aside.

"Well, at least I'm not wasting my time." Rielle said. Zackel relaxed.

Within the next half-second, Rielle had her own knife out, its point an inch from Zackel's eye. Zackel got a far closer look at the sharp end then he would have liked, due to how his eyes dilated in shock.

"Never stop fighting. Until the fight is done. And by done, I mean DONE." Rielle whispered. "From here on out, I expect you to follow by those rules in our training, mage. If you don't, I will hurt you. Not because I get angry at any success you may have. Because I get angry at your failure to be better. Do we understand?"

"…I understand." Zackel said. "Shall we take a five minute break?"

Rielle nodded, getting off Zackel and letting him up. Tossing her knife in her hand, Rielle watched as Zackel began summoning some water.

"Why didn't you attack me?"

"Pardon?"

"After asking for the break. There might have been an opening there. Did you think it was improper?"

"A bit. But I could also tell you were on your guard for such a thing. Would have just got me hurt."

"You _ARE _learning."

"You're an excellent teacher." Zackel said.

The mage couldn't be sure, but he could have sworn that Rielle turned away to hide a slight flush, something she had never done in regards to any of his other compliments.

Or maybe it was just a prelude to the joy she wore on her face when she promptly wiped the floor with him several more times shortly afterward, even with Zackel following her request to not hold back. Yet despite her dominance, Zackel did not feel like he'd been beaten to oblivion afterward. Not like their earlier times.

Part of Zackel thought he was getting better. The other part acknowledged he was, but nowhere to that degree. And Rielle certainly wasn't getting weaker.

Instead, Zackel got the sense that with their earlier sessions, she had been both toying with him and making sure she proved a point, hence his pain. Now that she was taking him seriously, he was still getting manhandled…but she was doing it without causing lasting damage or pain, even brief amounts. Her strength was astonishing, but her self-control was even more so, even more than he'd earlier observed, that she could go all out and yet not hurt him.

For all their disagreements, she now trusted him that much. From the way she talked, Zackel wasn't sure if she'd ever trusted someone like that. Maybe her warrior teachers, but no one else, it seemed.

Zackel, despite it all, still wasn't sure what that said about him, or her. He just went along with her workout slash training, and tried to keep his focus on that.

He'd been able to keep the roiling feelings buried deep in his gut, and for now, he wanted them to stay that way. Releasing them was a dice roll.

And after Jasciona, Zackel was loathe to play games of chance with people he cared about.

* * *

Still, Zackel was not so much a coward that he would not test the waters, as he did that night.

"I never did finish."

"Huh?" Rielle said, sharpening her axe as she looked at the Thrust board.

"Why no one tried to use the blizzard manipulation against the Horde."

The sour mood became very clear on Rielle's face, and she took another swig of PT.

"Well you might as well tell me. As stupid a reason as it's likely to be."

"Not so stupid. The blizzard creation and dispersion wasn't just thought up on the Alliance side, and even if it was, the Horde would probably soon follow suit. Using it on each other would just be wasting magical energy, with both sides constantly trying to use a weapon that might work one times out of ten, and not for very long. And then there's the more important reason." Zackel said. "Northrend belongs to Arthas. The best way, maybe the _ONLY _way we're going to keep that weapon out of his hands is if we work together on stopping his efforts. If Alliance and Horde mages start trying to use this defense against each other, then the united front is lost. Cracks form. And the Lich King gains an advantage, and people lose their lives. That's why the Alliance never tried to freeze the Horde out of Wintergrasp, or vice versa. It's the same reason the Kirin Tor opened Dalaran to both sides. Because they have to be above such things."

"And yet immediately, the Horde goes and forms its own little insular pocket in Dalaran."

"You mean the Sunreavers? They only did that because of the Silver Enclave, which did it first."

"And why did the Silver Enclave form?"

"Some high elves opposed blood elves joining the Kirin Tor…"

"And why would they do THAT?" Rielle said, and drank her canteen empty before offering it to Zackel. "While you're answering, more please."

"…don't you think you've had enough?"

"Who are YOU to tell me when I've had enough?" Rielle said, her eyes narrowing.

"I'm not…I just have noticed something. My mix seems to sharpen your tongue."

"You mean about the Horde. Pheh, Zackel, it's not like I didn't mention my dislike before. I don't like them, any of them."

"Yes…but the last time you said that, you sounded less…involved?"

"…I have a brain, mage. A pretty damn good one, if I do say so myself." Rielle said, her tone cross. "I am capable of using it, and I know its worth in constructing an argument. It can mean the difference maker if your enemy matches, or exceeds, your strength. But to me, my brain is a tool, just that. My heart is my true self. What you hear now, comes from my heart. I don't want to be using my brain, which is why I'm drinking this fruity crap. No offense." Rielle said, indicating her canteen.

"None taken."

"The blessings and understandings of the Light I, and my people, have learned from the Naaru, can only take us so far. Eventually, the other side has to step up. The Horde never does. Considering all the influence that psychotic nutcase Hellscream is gaining, I don't have a lot of hope for the future."

"Maybe, but…are you in the best position to pass judgments?"

"Zackel, shut up." Rielle said. "I didn't go to Wintergrasp looking to pick a fight with the Horde. I didn't go looking to confirm that all orcs are more attuned to being monsters than messiah-types, and that all their allies are savage, deranged, arrogant, pitiless, or a slave to old arrangements, or worse, using the excuse of old arrangements to unleash their worse, or true, sides. I went there to secure resources for the Alliance, and my people among them. To fight the Scourge, and the Legion. If the Horde had shown a whit of grace or willingness to work together, I would have had no problem working with them and sharing said resources. Might not have liked it, but I'd have lived with it. But they didn't. They attacked us, wanting it all for themselves. And despite the efforts on both sides, neither side could stop fighting. And after the Wrathgate…well, I almost got the sense of relief on the Horde side that they could stop all this democratic nonsense and impose their dominance without any bullshit getting in the way. Yeah, they didn't get me dumped here, my supposed human-on-the-Alliance teammate did. But all the time spent with you has made me realize that it's not what you are, it's WHO you are. Fel, yeah…maybe I need to actually meet Thrall, or some similarly enlightened Horde member…but I haven't. I can't see how I could without going out of my way. And in truth…I really don't want to."

Zackel was silent.

"So, you think I'm weak then?"

"…that's not the term I would use. Perhaps…drawn to familiar ground. Something all adventurers seek. It's hardest to move beyond it…but sometimes it's for the best."

"Maybe. As said, I know how to use my mind. And it's not closed." Rielle said, thrusting her canteen at Zackel again. "But my heart speaks as well. And I will not quiet its voice, no matter how much you may not like it."

"Your heart has its reasons. So I think it would be best if we changed topics." Zackel said, taking Rielle's canteen. "Still, let's make this filling-up the last one, shall we? I like your heart, but I like your mind too."

"Feeling's mutual." Rielle replied, giving Zackel a comradely pat/semi-shove on the shoulder. "Even if not all our opinions are."

* * *

_**Yet it's not enough, is it Wintersoul?**_

_**You know full well what alcohol does. It's why you really made it. Not to pass the time. Not to relax.**_

_**Because you want confirmation.**_

_**You dance and zig-zag around, but you want to know. You deny it and hate it as it begins to leak out, but you want to know.**_

_**Fel, you do know. Deep down.**_

_**You DO know.**_

_**Her TRUE heart. **_

_**And what it means in regards to you. Now, and then.**_

_**And you know how it will end, one way or another…**_

Zackel jerked up from his furs, staring at the stone wall for several seconds. The voice was echoing again. After all his efforts to understand and justify his most recent experiences, there it was once more.

Zackel's gorge rose, and he put his hand to his mouth, fighting to quiet his stomach. He didn't want to start all this up yet again. No more midnight wanderings, wondering if he was hearing voices or his own mind's dark corners. He'd done that enough.

He glanced at Rielle, finding her, as usual, peacefully asleep. Based on what had happened in the past, Zackel made a point of being semi-noisy as he went to put more wood on the fire.

And based on what he was about to do.

"Nuhsulowd." Rielle murmured as he knelt by her afterward.

"Sorry. Go back to sleep." Zackel said, lying down next to Rielle.

"Mmmmkay."

Sleep took longer to come to Zackel.

* * *

Journal Entry No # 452

_She didn't complain._

_I went to sleep beside her because that seemed to be a comfort on my mind, a purely selfish reason. I did the equivalent of climbing into her bed at night._

_She didn't wake me up angrily. She didn't tell me not to do that again when I woke up. She didn't even mention it. She just asked me to check how much food we had left that morning. And I know Rielle. She's not the type to think that she might have asked me to do something and then forgot about it. If she had a problem, she would have told me._

…_there was a point, during the night, where I was half-asleep, that I thought her arm was on my chest. Can't tell. Might have been a dream. Might have just been her random sleep-movement._

…_I…_

…_I can't tell if I'm being prudent or cowardly any more.

* * *

_

The voice did not come again, the next few days. It did not need to. Zackel's mind did the job for it.

He tried to quiet it by his interactions with Rielle, as they went through their various training routines. Throwing ice at her, grappling with her, and once even joining her on her run around the fortress. Sometimes it even worked, like during the times she and Zackel trained and worked in the hand to hand weapons fighting Rielle was trying to teach him. For brief periods of time, Zackel was lost in those thoughts, of the faint inklings of not just learning a few defensive tricks for himself. Of being on the edge of something larger, of a brand new fighting style, a hybrid combat and magic mix that could have all the potential in the world.

Then Rielle would toss a light insult his way, or smile at him, or look at him in a way that their eyes locked, and it would all come roaring back. Zackel tried his best to hide it, but in truth he was starting to reach his wit's end. Worse, he had no idea what tact to take to solve the problem. Or whether the cure would be worse than the disease.

Whether Rielle noticed or not, Zackel could not say. She had her own set of amazing eyes, in many aspects. And with her iron-clad self-control, he might never realize the truth of what she realized, or knew. Or not until it was too late.

The truth…

However bitter it might be.

…And whether he was subconsciously aware that he was upping the potency of the PT mix each night, or whether he was completely oblivious to it…didn't really matter in the end.

* * *

And so night fell, and the usual events occurred. Until they, after about two hours and a fair bit of PT, crossed over into the unusual.

"You're kidding me." Rielle giggled, putting a Thrust stone down. "You slept with a dwarf?"

"Once, once." Zackel replied. He wasn't quite sure how the conversation had gotten onto this topic, or why he wasn't steering away from it as he normally would. Part of him wanted to say it was because Zackel had left the subtle planes of intoxication behind that night and was well on his way to the more overt ones. But the other part had chimed up that it was because Rielle was his friend, and you could share secrets and experiences with friends. And it had been a long time since he'd had a real, true friend. Not since Jasciona…

And Daldion.

"Well, technically three times. It didn't last very long." Zackel said. It testified to his state that the sour feeling of his memories was not enough to snarl the tread he was heading down now.

"You were that bad?"

"What? No, no, no…!" Zackel said. "We were just briefly passing through each other's lives. We had some fun and a new experience together, and moved on. Besides, she didn't complain."

"And you?"

"No complaints either. True, it was a little awkward at first…but I adapted, as did she. She actually said she liked kissing a face without a beard. And the feel of it kissing her and…I think we've gone far enough there."

"Awwwwwww." Rielle said. "What was her name?"

"Nekola. Nekola Splinterset. She was a priest. Met while investigating The Badlands on some possible new activity around Uldaman. Helped each other, enjoyed each other's company, intimately a few times, then she headed back to Ironforge and I went up to the Arathi Highlands. She had a really nice laugh. Good dancer too."

"You two danced?"

"No, she danced for me. I played music. Had a small talent for the lute, once upon a time. I'd do a little strumming, and she and some of our party would dance." Zackel said, before drinking more PT. A tiny voice spoke up in his mind, whispering a warning, but for the most part Zackel ignored it. "You act like this is strange. It's not like I took a vow of celibacy after Jasciona."

"I just thought someone as uptight as you…"

"Uptight? You wound me." Zackel said. "I didn't bed a new woman every three days or something, but once I started traveling…well, it's a dangerous world, and there's a lot of hardship. Sometimes people want to forget that, or want a taste of it without leaving their safe corners. So yes, there was a farm girl or two. One bar waitress. Two other women I traveled with, besides Nekola. I never got involved with a woman who was already in a relationship of course, as far as I know. And being an alchemist, I have certain options available to me to prevent unfortunate things like unexpected pregnancies. Even if they taste foul as hell. That's why I was able to mix up a breath tincture, by the way. Experience had taught me women don't like be kissed after drinking something like my protective draughts."

"Still, a dwarf?"

"Why judge? As you yourself said, we're all crafted from the same clay in the end. Heck, I've met at least one woman who was in a relationship with a male draenei, though I didn't see him at the time. Not to insult your race, but those tentacles they have on their faces…well, compared to that, a dwarf is, uh…not as noticeable to me?"

"Not good enough." Rielle said, giving Zackel her usual smack. "But I'll stop harping on it. At least it wasn't a gnome."

"Hey, what's wrong with a…well actually yeah, that _could _be seen as…having unfortunate implications. But I'd rather not be a hypocrite, so I won't judge." Zackel said, looking down at the Thrust board. "Was it your move or mine?"

"Who cares?" Rielle said, putting a stone down. The look on her face made it seem like she expected Zackel to protest, but instead he just shrugged and laid down another stone. "Well well. When did you become fun, mage?"

"I'm not. My boorish nature has just infected you enough that your definition of fun has changed."

"Ah, an infection. Finally you pick an appropriate comparison to what you are. I was getting tired of 'powerful wizard' and 'attractive to women'."

Zackel surprised himself by laughing, and then paused at the fact. Then a loud belch abruptly bubbled up from his stomach, and its noise and the look on Zackel's face afterward caused Rielle to crack up.

"…that…ha ha…should not be so funny…" Rielle said a brief period of time later. "I think I better sweat some of this drink out. Zackel, give me a beat."

"What?"

"You like to watch women dance? Give me a beat, I'll dance and ruin the experience for you in the future. I'm just mean like that."

"Uh…okay…?" Zackel said, as he began trying to drum something resembling a rhythm on the Thrust board.

"No no, that sucks. Try something else. No…no! Ugh!" Rielle said with mock frustration as she stood up. "Just when I think you can't suck any harder. Knock it off, I'll hum my own beat."

Zackel didn't have the heart to tell Rielle she didn't exactly have tone mastery over the humming/wordless vocalization that came out of her mouth as she danced. In truth, he didn't really notice that fact as Rielle danced in front of him.

"…uh…Rielle…after you're done you should drink a fair bit of water. Make sure you keep yourself hydrated…and all…"

"Oh please. Like you care about how exsuccous I might get."

"…what?"

"HAH! I FINALLY KNOW A WORD YOU DON'T! It almost makes up for how I'm debasing myself over here." Rielle said, as she continued to dance.

"If you really think you're debasing yourself, stop."

"Oh, you'd like that wouldn't you? Me all zonked out on your poisons so you can do perverted things to me."

"Please. Like I could do anything to you you didn't want me to. Besides, YOU'RE the one who insisted on details about Nekola."

"It was probably a pity screw anyway." Rielle said, and kept dancing. Zackel opened his mouth to reply, and realized it was a secondary concern.

_It has been so long, and it's not like she doesn't like you on some level. And come on, it's not…_

The ghost of the memory, this time, _was _enough to sour Zackel's mood, and he turned his attention to conjuring up the water for Rielle. She didn't notice for a bit, but when she did, she looked insulted.

"Oh why do I even bother, you wouldn't know a good thing if it bit you on the ass." Rielle said, her tone mostly not serious, though there was a noticeable touch there.

"I resemble that remark." Zackel said. Rielle snatched up her water-filled canteen, stuck her tongue out at Zackel, and began drinking. "In all seriousness though…there's plenty to pay attention to. In all your aspects Rielle."

"Empty flattery." Rielle said, turning around and walking over to the alchemy table where Zackel had left his prepared chemicals.

"Hardly. This mess, stuck together…it's been a worthwhile experience. It almost makes me glad I used my Runes before I got here."

Zackel was not so under the influence that he wasn't able to see Rielle's body stiffen, and a second later the bottom dropped out of his stomach at what he had just said.

"…what." Rielle said, turning back around.

"Uh…I was…"

"If you try and change what you just said, I will actually be angry, Zackel." Rielle said, as she crossed back over and knelt by the mage. "What do you mean you used up your Runes?"

"…does it matter?" Zackel said helplessly.

"Zackel. I'm not saying I would easily throw our time away. But I never pressed about _why _you didn't have any Runes of Portals, and it's becoming clear to me that maybe I should have." Rielle said. "So I ask again, and I want the truth. Why did you not have any Runes?"

Zackel was silent.

"Zackel…"

"You're not going to like it."

"Unless you purposely got someone killed and fled prosecution, and all that earlier stuff you told me about being up here was a lie…well, I don't think you're that good a liar. So try me."

"…even so…" Zackel said, looking at the fire. "You're not going to like it."

"That's not going to get you out of it. Tell me."

Zackel closed his eyes and sighed deeply. Well, maybe it was time to cross this barrier. Maybe it would be for the best.

Zackel had no idea how wrong he was.


	18. Why We Fight: Down Among The Dead Men

Chapter 18: Down Among The Dead Men

"_You ever done something really stupid Rielle?"_

"_I don't work in the business of doing stupid things. I know that must seem astonishing to a mage, but believe me when I say it works."_

"_Well, perhaps I shall be more specific. You ever done something really stupid because you wanted to prove someone wrong?"_

"…maybe. But this isn't about me, Zack. What stupid thing did YOU do?"

_Zackel sighed deeply. He'd done a very good job burying the events that had occurred immediately before entering the Alterac Mountains, even mentally excising them from how his 'good idea' had gone wrong because those events had not been his responsibility. Dredging them back up only made him realize how lucky and how stupid he had been to act how he did. And what role it played in his current situation._

"_I came up here to look for possible cast-off magical artifacts. Like all the other Alliance people who come here now, I set off from doing this from Southshore. But I didn't do that immediately upon landing. I waited around the town a few days, to get an idea of the lay of the land. Considering how contested Hillsbrad has become the past several years, I wasn't the only adventurer around. I spent some time in Southshore's inn and tavern, and shortly before I left I told my 'peers' what I was doing."_

"_And what, they wanted to horn in? And you didn't want to share?"_

"_Hardly." Zackel said. "My idea made me a laughingstock. I really don't know WHY…my only idea was that I was the only mage-type around at the time and the brawn-before-brains type didn't like me because of it. Maybe, like you, they had bad experiences in the past, though I didn't do anything to flaunt my so-called greater intelligence. Whatever their reasons, they thought my idea was stupid, and mocked me for even coming up with it. When I didn't back down, they mocked me even more. You might not see much of it Rielle, but I have my pride. After all the verbal abuse I got over my plan, well, I didn't just set out to find magical artifacts. I set out to prove all of my detractors wrong."_

"_And you were in such a hurry you forget your Runes?"_

"_No. I didn't. I wasn't that mad." Zackel said. "Mages are always supposed to carry at least two Runes, and preferably more. But Runes don't grow on trees, and my monetary pockets were rather light at the time. It's why I was hunting for magical artifacts to begin with. So all I had was two."_

_Zackel paused, looking at the canteen filled with PT, and then put it down. He didn't need to get any drunker._

"_I had been warned about Tarren Mills, the Forsaken outpost on the northern side of the Hills. I had not dismissed those warnings…but my irritation affected me otherwise. Had I just gone out, I would have given the town as wide a berth as possible, even if it doubled my travel time. Instead, I only went slightly off the beaten path…"

* * *

_

"I started on a journey about a year ago, to a little town called Morrow in the land of Dun Morogh…" Zackel sang quietly to himself as he picked his way through the Hillsbrad forest encroaching up against the mountain. He paused to check his compass, and after assessing he hadn't veered off too far off course, looked up at the sun. Still a fair bit of daylight left.

"I've never been much of a traveler, and I really didn't know, that Morrow was the hardest place I'd ever try to go…" Zackel said, peering off into the forest to his left. He wasn't sure exactly where he was: he wouldn't know he was hitting the Alterac Mountains until the forest completely thinned out and he started finding snow on the ground. Still, so far so good.

"So I went down to the flight mounts for my flier and applied, for tips regarding Morrow not expecting to be guyed. Said I, 'My friend, I'd like to go to Morrow and return, no later than tomorrow for I haven't time to burn.'…" Zackel hummed in the same low tone, continuing his walk.

His step was very quiet. The twig snap that sounded was also about one and a half seconds off for his foot to have made it. Zackel stopped, his eyes narrowing.

Scanning around detected no movement, but Zackel knew he wasn't a hunter.

His ears, however, were good enough to catch the follow up twig snaps. They were even good enough to pinpoint their direction. Zackel turned towards the noise, chill energies beginning to gather around his staff.

The mountain lion looked like it hadn't had a good meal in some time. It might have explained why it was slowly stalking towards Zackel instead of something more inconvenient to him, like dropping down from a tree, or even approaching him at a full sprint. Still, the fact that Zackel had seen it didn't stop it, as it bared its teeth and hissed, slight ropes of saliva dripping from its jaws.

"…not a meal." Zackel said, thrusting his staff at the mountain lion. It did not back down. "No! Back! BACK!"

The mountain lion roared and charged instead.

Zackel was impressed by his own aim: the hurled blade of ice managed to slice the mountain lion down the side as he'd wanted. The big cat recoiled from the wound, snarling in rage at Zackel. A few more hurled ice blasts, deliberately aimed to miss, was enough to convince it that Zackel was not going to be any prey it could handle. Looping around, it bounded off into the forest.

"Don't blame you boy. I'd wager the meals around here have begun to taste rotten. Literally." Zackel said, raising his staff. He pulled out his compass again to re-gain his bearings before starting back off.

"Said he to me, 'Now let me see if I have heard you right. You'd like to go to Morrow and return tomorrow night. You should have gone to Morrow yesterday and back today, for the flight that goes to Morrow is a mile upon its way…"

Unlike the last time, Zackel had no audio cue for what happened next. Instead, the projectile just slammed into his upper back, sending him pitching forward onto his face with a startled yell.

The immense sluggishness sank into his muscles almost immediately; Zackel didn't have to be an alchemist to know he had been shot with a potent tranquilizer. Fear erupted through his body, but on its heels came knowledge of what he had to try and do. Steeling himself, Zackel began to gather his power to encase himself in a block of protective ice. Hopefully by the time he came out of it (and assuming whatever had shot him couldn't get into it themselves), the poison would have run its course. Such strong chemicals tended to have very short potency times, lest they kill the victim. And if whoever had shot Zackel had wanted him dead, they would have just used a fatal toxin…

As it turned out, _they_ was literal, as Zackel suddenly felt bony fingers pulling him from the ground. And he still needed at least four seconds before he could complete his spell…

He didn't get it.

"Heh. Stupid meat." The Forsaken said, before he rammed his sword-hilt into Zackel's head. The undead's nasty laughter followed Zackel all the way down into the darkness.

* * *

And the undead's nasty stagnant water was what drew Zackel back from it, the mage surging back to consciousness with a disgusted gasp. Shaking his head nearly caused Zackel to smash the back of it into the stone wall behind him, and as he twisted and spat, he quickly realized that he was semi-lying down with his arms chained above him.

"Meat's awake, ma'am." The same male voice said. Zackel tried to blink sight back into his eyes, even as said eyes tried to adjust to the dim light. He wasn't quick enough, as bone fingers nearly as sharp as knives reached out and seized him by the chin.

"Hello." The Forsaken female said, before she shoved Zackel's head backwards into the wall. Strange colors exploded across Zackel's eyes, even as the strength went out of his legs again. Zackel was vaguely aware of laughter behind him, two different male voices. He recognized one of the laughs; it was the same one that had chased him when he'd been knocked out.

"Ah good, you're STILL awake. Maybe you'll be worth some effort after all." The Forsaken female said, pulling Zackel up by his hair; this time, she actually let Zackel's vision fully solidify (her rancid breath helped). Zackel tried not to let the sick fear that was running through him show up on his face as he took in what he could see of hers: the Forsaken was wearing a purple hood over her head, just revealing her sickly green face and yellow-tinted eyes. "Oh, and just so you know…"

The Forsaken held up a small hand-sized white stone. Zackel's eyes fixated on it a second before the Forsaken crushed it between her bone fingers, the remaining muscle tissue showing surprising strength in reducing the Heathstone to pebbles.

"Gone. Like all your hope. You shouldn't have come here human." The Forsaken female said. "These Hills belong to us."

"…I…did not come here…to dispute who or who does not own this land." Zackel said. "I meant none of you any harm, nor was I aiding the efforts of anyone who was."

"A likely story." The Forsaken female said, stepping back, allowing Zackel to see her two companions. Well, technically there were three: the third one, another female, had not spoken, though she favored Zackel with a nasty grin. The two males wore the same purple headpieces the interrogating female did, as well as the same purple-themed outfits she herself wore, though hers was slightly fancier. The other female did not wear the same style outfit, though her decayed shirt and pants were purple too, and her hair, a shocking upright mass of green, was exposed (and she could have benefited with a mask, as the flesh had rotten away around her mouth revealing exposed teeth and festering gums, hence making her nasty grin even more unpleasant).

"I wasn't anywhere NEAR your town! I was going out of my way…"

The backhand caused Zackel to see more interesting colors. He groaned inwardly, trying to focus his magic. Without his staff, and with his arms restrained the way they were, it wasn't going to be easy. It was far more likely they'd see his efforts and run over and attack him before he could even get a simple spell off. Which left the only proper spell he had was the language translation glyph he'd cast on himself before he'd set off (if you met the enemy, it didn't do you well if you couldn't understand what they were saying), but that couldn't help him, and it was clear the Forsaken both knew about the glyph and that reality, based on the fact they weren't bothering to speak Common to him.

"Truth be told, meat, I really don't care." The Forsaken woman said. "We found you, and now you belong to us. To use as we see fit."

"…this does not…"

This time, the blow was a full on punch that slammed Zackel's head into the back of the wall again. The darkness surged up in Zackel's gaze once more, though this time it fell away.

"Samsa. Humbert. Fetch my interrogation tools." The female Forsaken said. "Maybe we can actually extract some information from him, and if not, well…it will be a good way to pass the time."

"Yes m'lady Darthalia." Samsa and Humbert said in near-unison.

"You don't have to DO THIS…!" Zackel rasped, causing the Forsaken called Darthalia, who seemed to be in charge, to turn back in his direction. "We don't have to be enemies, you don't have to think…"

The resulting blow from Darthalia ended up tearing open Zackel's cheek. He recoiled and found his feet slipping, his arms wrenched painfully above him as he fell. Darthalia stepped forward, seizing Zackel's face with her knife-like fingers and yanking him up face to face with her.

"You lost the right to tell us anything when you let us die, meat. And if there's one thing I can't stand, it's you bags of water leaking. Well…not without the tint of red anyway." Darthalia said. "Believe me, we are the least of your worries. When I grow bored, I'll turn you over to Apothecary Lydon. I'm sure he'll have some INTERESTING ideas with what to do with…"

A loud, repetitive thud abruptly began sounding from the rear of the room (from where Zackel was positioned, anyway). Darthalia glanced backwards with clear annoyance, before letting Zackel go and wiping her hand on the wall.

"Open that Lesh."

"Yes m'lady." The green-haired Forsaken female said, turning and heading towards a door Zackel couldn't make out in the gloom. The resulting flood of light from the outside momentarily blinded him.

"Hinott?" Zackel heard Darthalia said with clear annoyance. "This had better be important."

"Uh yes, m'lady…I'm afraid there has been…" Was all the Forsaken male managed to get out before the door crashed open again, nearly knocked off its hinges by the impact used to open it.

There was no second blaze of light to re-blind Zackel, because the orc that stomped through the doorway nearly blocked the whole structure.

"HIGH EXECUTOR DARTHALIA." The orc thundered, saying the title like it was the worst of condemnations instead of a position. The striking thing about the orc's face was its upward tusk/fangs: unlike most orcs, this one's teeth had clearly been filed down to end on dull points for some unknown purpose. Everything else, from its massive body, to its purple-black receded long hair, some of which was tied up at the crown of its head in a ponytail/topknot style and the rest composed of a raggedly short cut semi-beard, to its dark yellow-green skin, was traditional to the orc species. Including said species' legendary anger, which was causing Samsa and Humbert to begin reaching towards their weapons and Lesh to back up, clearly looking, despite her desiccated features, like she'd like to be anywhere but here. Zackel could not see the Forsaken named Hinott: he had actually been knocked to his knees by the door's violent entrance, and the orc had grabbed him and hurled him aside before he could react to his presence.

"Prigak. I don't see why…" Darthalia said before the orc's gigantic hand surged forward and seized the Forsaken by the front of her outfit. From the little Zackel could glean, Darthalia had clearly not expected this.

"NO MORE NONSENSE! I HAVE HAD ENOUGH OF IT FROM YOU!" The orc Prigak snarled. The sound of unsheathing weapons drew the orc's attention, as Samba and Humbert had, with this violent act, reacted in kind and produced their blades.

Unfortunately for them, Prigak was only holding Darthalia with one hand because the other was clutching a bladed mace that looked at big as Zackel. Though with the smoldering intensity in the orc's eyes, Zackel would have believed Prigak could have incinerated the two Forsaken with a gaze.

"YOU HAD BETTER BE SURE." Prigak growled, before turning his attention back to Darthalia, who seemed to be trying to collect herself.

"What is the meaning of this Boneripper? I told you…"

"MY MATE HAS GONE INTO LABOR." Prigak snapped.

"What does that have to do with me?"

"EVERYTHING!!!" Prigak roared, before he smashed Darthalia into a wall. That was enough for Humbert and Samsa, who attacked.

Three seconds later, they were flat on the ground, Prigak having swung around and smashed both of them with one mighty roundhouse mace blow, carrying Darthalia with him before turning a complete 360 and slamming her back into the wall.

"I came here as a show of good faith, to aid your kind with its troubles! Krihina and I should have been on our way back to Orgrimmar or to your Undercity weeks, if not MONTHS ago! Your choices have led us to remain here far beyond our original ken, and honor demanded we do not leave until the task was complete! Even when it began possible that there could be complications with the birth!"

"Why are you wasting time raging at me then orc? Go speak with Voidglare…!"

"VOIDGLARE IS ABSENT. HE HAS LEFT, ON AN ERRAND, DESPITE MY REQUEST THAT HE REMAIN SHOULD THIS HAPPEN. A REQUEST YOU EITHER IGNORED OR FORGOT ABOUT." Prigak raged. "EVEN THAIVAND IS ABSENT, GONE ON THE SAME ERRAND! THERE ARE NO TRANSPORT BATS AT THE HUB, AND ZARISE COULD NOT SAY WHEN ANY WOULD RETURN! KRIHINA HAS DETERIORATED FAR FASTER THEN EVEN I FEARED POSSIBLE: I CANNOT TAKE HER TO HAMMERFALL BY LAND! YOUR IDIOCY HAS TRAPPED ME HERE, SO YOU ARE GOING TO PROVIDE ME A SOLUTION!"

"You dare…" Darthalia stupidly said. That got her Prigak's mace smashing a hole in the wall beside her head.

"I tolerated your viciousness and sadism, and how it affected our efforts, because I was not the one placed in charge here. I even showed tolerance in what happened in Northrend, and how the creature who gave you your orders was involved." Prigak hissed. "Instead of providing me even the most cursory hospitality, you whiled your time away with your abhorrent need to inflict harm. You had best hope there is more to you than that, High Executor, for if you do not provide an answer forth haste, every bit of pain and suffering my mate endures I will visit on your head a thousand times over, the Nether be DAMNED of the consequences. And unless you are swift, that may yet happen any…"

"I can help." Zackel managed to say. To Zackel's somewhat surprise, he actually managed to speak loudly enough to get Prigak's attention, as the orc turned his furious gaze onto Zackel.

"How do you speak Orcish?'

"I don't…it's what you're hearing. Magic. I'm a mage…"Zackel coughed, trying to get to his feet. "I can help you."

"Why would a HUMAN mage want to grant me aid?"

"Believe me…" Zackel coughed, a touch of the brackish water having found its way into his lungs. "That's a good question. It's not pure altruism. It's an exchange. If I get you, and your mate, into proper hands…I get to go free."

"This orc cannot…!" Darthalia yelled, before Prigak tightened his grip on her throat.

"Why should I trust you?" Prigak said. The fact that he didn't immediately dismiss Zackel altogether struck Zackel as a good sign, and he continued.

"Provided the Forsaken haven't destroyed any more of my personal items, which I don't think they have, from what I can see…" Zackel said, gesturing with his head. Prigak's anger towards the Forsaken had allowed Zackel some time to recover and to scan the room, and he'd located his staff and bags set on a table across the room. "I have Runes of Portals. I can use them to get you where you're going. If you don't trust me, you can hold a blade to my throat the whole time and slit it if you think it's necessary. You can even throw me through the portal first to make sure it's real, if you wish…"

"Don't listen to his lies, Boneripper!" Darthalia rasped. "He cannot transport you to any Horde city! Mage transport require attuning, and no human would be attuned to…!"

"She's not wrong." Zackel interrupted. "But I heard what you said about a Voidglare. From it, I gather he was a mage. If you let me have access to some of his magical artifacts…I can use their residual energies to form a one-time portal to the Undercity. I don't know if you have anything that would let me try the same with any other Horde cities, so…"

"We do not." Prigak said, releasing Darthalia from his grip. "You heard the mage. Release him and bring Voidglare's artifacts."

"WHAT? Are you actually…?!"

"I do NOT trust him." Prigak preemptively answered, turning his fearsome glare onto Zackel. "And should I sense even the slightest mote or hint of treachery, I will crush him into a fine paste. But until he proves he truly has nothing to offer, I no longer have the time or options to think otherwise."

"Why should I…?!"

"BECAUSE IF YOU DO NOT, I WILL DESTROY YOU AND EVERY OTHER FORSAKEN IN THIS MILL UNTIL I REACH THE LINK IN THE CHAIN THAT COMMANDS SOME SENSE!" Prigak bellowed. "And from what I have seen in Krusk's eyes, I DO NOT BELIEVE HE WILL TRY AND STOP ME!"

Darthalia inhaled through her nose, the rotten tissue causing the noise to have an oddly moist undertone, and then she turned her head towards Humbert and Samsa, who had finally managed to get back up, minus a few teeth.

"Release the prisoner. Keep your swords on his breastbone and windpipe the whole time. If you even BEGIN to sense magical energies gathering, cut him to pieces." Darthalia said. "Come with me Prigak, I will have to collaborate with Lydon to get the necessary items…"

"Wait…!" Zackel said. "Remember the exchange! If I help you, I go free from harm!"

"It is done." Prigak said, stalking out of the door. Darthalia paused before following, looking back at the mage.

The look of festering hate that the Forsaken gave Zackel made him briefly wondered if staying tied up to be tortured and worse would have been the better option for him.

Then Humbert blocked his vision, the two Forsaken removing the chains from his wrists and making sure they were as rough as possible doing so.

Zackel didn't complain. He couldn't waste the energy.

* * *

Another mage saying had occurred to Zackel nearly ten minutes later: what you claim you can do, what you think you can do, and what you can actually do, is rarely what gets done. Of course, whoever had coined that phrase likely hadn't had a frantic orc literally breathing down their neck, which Zackel felt did wonders for one's improvisational efforts.

And improvising was exactly what Zackel had to do. Instantaneous transport by mages was an immensely troublesome business, and one of the later things an apprentice was taught. Any intelligent student quickly realized it was a process that would take months, if not years, of refinement before it could be done with the ease of simpler spells like manipulating temperature.

Firstly, a transport spell, of any stripe, required a Rune of Portals. The Rune stored a very specific kind of magical energy that was needed in addition to the summoner's own to complete the process. Very rare, very skilled mages could perform the spell without the Rune, but the risk of killing oneself, either by frying something vital within the body or making an error in the spell and ending up fused to something else upon arrival, ensured that even those rare elite attempted it. Next, there were technically several different ways one could perform such a spell. The first, and most common level, was to utilize the spell to slightly bend the concept of space and time and open a wormhole between two points. As the mage grew in skill, he or she could potentially learn how to skip even that step and literally use their own body as the wormhole, causing them to blink out of existence and re-appear at a set point (a process also performable with the artifact known as a Heathstone, though that could only return you to _one _set point, said point not being easily changed). The strongest magicians, after much practice, could bring others along with them in such a process.

Zackel was not that strong or practiced, and worse, he was not attempting to transport to friendly ground. Zackel had offered that possibility, pointing out that there was considerable less risk involved if he tried to transport himself and the orcs to some place like Ironforge. It hadn't worked: the orc had been vehement that he would not enter an Alliance stronghold, no matter what. Strangely, his mate Krihina, brought into the room gingerly by a few Forsaken shortly after Zackel had begun to work, agreed with him, even with her pallid skin and swollen stomach. The Forsaken had tried to pounce on Zackel's suggestion as evidence of his intended recreancy, but Prigak had just bellowed at them to shut up and bring the artifacts that belonged to the absent Forsaken Voidglare faster.

That they had done, and Zackel had gotten to work, settling down in front of the gathered magical items and attempting to get their 'vibe'. Once he'd isolated that, he would initiate a modified version of the wormhole process and attempt to re-direct the 'exit end' to seek out the strongest nearby source of the residual energies Zackel had scanned instead of an area Zackel himself was attuned to. Not only that, but he had to do it fast, and without making his only 'supporter' suspicious that he was attempting a trick to escape.

Zackel suspected he didn't have much slack in either case, and the evidence of that was Krihina. Zackel hadn't seen much of the female orc to really describe her, and he couldn't try and glean more visual information now as he was busy with his other efforts, not to mention she was now lying in the corner on some furs, an occasional low groan emitting from her. If Prigak's seething agitation hadn't motivated Zackel, those sounds would have. There were very few circumstances where Zackel would have enjoyed hearing something in pain.

Even in a situation like this.

"_Skaro__…__antalin__…__urbanka__…__freytus__…"_ Zackel whispered, feeling the unpleasant crawl of defiant arcane energies twisting through his body.

"What is TAKING so long?!" Prigak yelled. "You had best not be attempting a trick, mage! Believe me, if I suspect your portal, I may cut you in half instead of throwing you through it!"

"I am VERY aware of the situation, orc." Zackel replied, trying to keep his voice calm as he pressed his hands together. "It won't do you any good if I cannot fully ossify this route, and considering my life is on the line, it won't do _me _any good to pointlessly delay."

"HURRY!" Prigak snarled.

"I understand your desire for haste, warrior, but there are some things you can only rush so much." Zackel said, feeling the sweat run down his forehead and back. "_Artesia__…__proanom__…__laylora__…"_

Zackel clamped his hands together harder, pressing his primary fingers against each other and peering over their tips as the wall behind him to fog in his vision. He was getting it. Despite all the troubles and distractions, he was getting it…

"_Detrios__…__crallica__…__logomundopsi__…"_

From the artifacts in front of him, the Rune of Portals began to lift up, faint traces of misty energy flowing from the magical items as it aligned with Zackel's direct line of sight.

"_Calufrax drahva__…__!__"_ Zackel whispered, as the shimmering before him increased. He had a thread. Now he just had to draw it in… "_Raxacoricofallapatorius__…__!__"_

The Rune of Portals in front of Zackel began to crumble, the dust flying out and towards the shifting colors in front of Zackel, colors that the rest of the room was finally beginning to make out. Zackel blinked sweat out of his eyes, gritting his teeth as a surge of painful energy ran up his spine. Just a touch more…

"_Marinus__…"_ Zackel semi-hissed. "_Dido__…__vortis__…__!__"_

A loud ripping noise sounded through the air as the portal fully manifested, The rune vanished completely, even as Zackel recoiled backwards, his vision swimming momentarily before it settled. He felt warmth coming from his nose; much to his lack of surprise, his fingers came away moist with blood when he checked the source of the feeling.

"…well, I suppose it could have been worse." Zackel murmured.

The hands seizing him caught Zackel by such surprise that he wasn't able to muster any resistance, the painful claws yanking him to his feet.

"We're not done yet." Darthalia said, as she began to drag Zackel towards the portal, The mage was vaguely aware of Prigak raising a protest, but Zackel didn't get to hear much as Darthalia seized him by the hair.

"WAIT DO-!"

The remains of Darthalia's ears were apparently quite deaf, as she rammed Zackel's head and face into the portal.

Had the wormhole been constructed by another mage, Zackel was quite sure he would have died, or at least been horrendously disfigured. But the portal had been constructed by his hands, and hence being attuned to him, had considerably less of an effect during what occurred.

Which was still something Zackel would not have wanted to experience. Magical transport via portals did not function like a window: it operated more like a brief road that the travelers were drawn along. There was a reason mages generally did not test their portals by contact, or at least tried not to. Inserting body parts would cause you to get yanked into the portal after a few seconds at most, which is why anyone who _did _testportals by touch made sure they were able to recognize the signs of a properly made one with as brief a contact as possible. Keep it up too long, and 'too long' in this case was not very long at all, and the portal began acting like a vacuum to draw you in.

And if something was _holding you in place_…

To Zackel, it felt like someone had inserted a dozen dull hooks into his face, eyes, and the bones beneath, and begun to yank on them. The sensation could not be described as painful: a better term would be _unnatural_, as Zackel experienced something like his head being treated like a bad tooth that had to be pulled. Zackel would have cried out, except there was no air to breath inside the shifting energies of the wormhole…

It was likely he'd only had his head held inside the portal for five seconds at most; unsurprisingly, it felt several times that length when he was finally yanked back out of it. Reality as he knew it rudely announced its return by slamming into Zackel's senses full tilt, an experience that was not helped by Prigak throwing him aside. Zackel crashed down roughly among Voidglare's artifacts, and a random thought chimed in the back of his head that he'd best hope he hadn't broken any, because he was light on funds and couldn't afford to replace them.

The exact details of the yelling behind Zackel were lost on him, understandably. Apparently Prigak was quite irked over Darthalia's action, which she tried to justify by saying she had been making sure that Zackel's efforts were not a trap, to which Prigak had responded that killing or maiming the mage might have damaged or destroyed the portal, or something to that extent, Zackel was too busy making sure his ability to comprehend the world was returning. That and checking to see if his skull and face hadn't been distended like taffy.

It was all he really got to do, as no sooner did he start getting up then he found Humbert and Samsa's blades at his throat. He raised his hands slowly, doing his best to indicate his lack of a threat. Whether that worked or not, Zackel couldn't say: the expressions the pair wore tended towards the immutable.

"What are you doing?!" Prigak growled, stomping over to Zackel's side and making the two Forsaken scatter. Zackel placed his hands down on the ground, planning to rise once more. Prigak did it for him instead, abruptly seizing Zackel by the shoulder and pulling him up like Zackel weighed nothing.

"Come, mage. Let us see if you have any worth." Prigak said, producing a dagger from somewhere and placing it against Zackel's side. "Walk. We shall go through the portal together. If you did not make it stable enough to prevent the blade from piercing your body, or should we emerge in an environment that is even remotely hostile, the poison on my weapon will make you WISH you had kept silent and chained to the wall."

"…okay." Zackel said quietly, as the orc turned him around and approached the portal with him. To Zackel's small surprise, they stopped in front of it.

"You." Prigak said, turning away and pointing his dagger at Darthalia, though he kept his other hand firmly on Zackel's shoulder. "Have my mate prepared for transport when I return. And do not attempt anything, Forsaken. I assure you, there is no revenge for any perceived slight you feel that will protect you from what you will suffer for it."

Darthalia glowered again, from the little Zackel could see, and that little swiftly ended as Prigak turned around and jabbed the end of the dagger into his torso again. The orc said nothing more, stepping into the portal as he took Zackel with him.

Despite the energizing, straining feeling, considerable vertigo, and numbing cold of the wormhole transport, Zackel swore he felt the dagger at his side the whole way.

Luckily for him, the orc had better footing than he did on the wet stone that the pair abruptly appeared on. The end result was him drawing the dagger away as Zackel staggered, before the orc forcibly adjusted Zackel's position and once again put the dagger in place as he looked around.

Zackel had never seen Lordaeron, or the Undercity before…and he really didn't get to see much of it now, as Zackel's improvised portal had caused the pair to emerge in a darker corner of the Magic Quarter instead of up on the main structure that most attuned portals appeared on. However, Zackel definitely got to smell it, as the reek of decay and worse slammed into his nostrils so hard Zackel felt like his sinuses would never get clogged again. He gagged a few times before covering his mouth…which was right around the time that sight again demanded his full attention.

The slow, out of place portal had not gone unnoticed, and several Forsaken guards had gathered. Zackel swallowed at the sight.

"Orc?" One of them said.

"I AM PRIGAK BONERIPPER!" Prigak declared, and proceeded to list some titles and accomplishments that Zackel didn't really pay attention to as he was trying to decide what his next move might have to be.

"So you claim. What is this unusual transport? Did you bring a prisoner?" The Forsaken guard said.

"I have no time for explanations! I demand under our treaties and the services we paid to Dark Lady Sylvannas to be brought to the finest medical practitioners you have! My mate is due to give birth very soon and she is experiencing complications. If you deny me what I need, let me assure you my rage and the rage of my people will shake this tomb apart…!"

"No need to be so dramatic, orc." The Forsaken said, before looking at one of his companions. "Well, you heard him. Fetch Edras, or maybe Father Lazurus. And I take it this is not your mate." The Forsaken guard said, directing the last question back towards Zackel and Prigak as the guard he'd initially addressed hurried off.

"He…established this pathway. I must return through it to retrieve her." Prigak said, taking his hand off Zackel's shoulder and, to his relief, removing the dagger from his side. The relief was short lived, as Prigak turned around and prepared to leave through the portal. Zackel had a feeling the orc would not be conductive to the thought of Zackel accompanying him.

Which meant he was stuck on this end for now.

"And what do you want _us_ to do with him?" The Forsaken guard said, having gleaned the same thing.

"Don't let him leave." Prigak said, and vanished back through the wormhole. Zackel grimaced, before reaching out and doing a brief test of the gateway. As far as he could tell, it was remaining stable, and would for the foreseeable future.

Zackel would have felt prouder of his efforts had the circumstances not been so bad. The low chuckle that sounded behind him made Zackel realize they could yet get worse, and he turned around to see that the Forsaken guards were looking at him with wicked amusement.

"Don't let you _leave_." The speaking Forsaken said. "Tell me mage…do you know exactly how we could interpret that?"

"…as the orc wanted it?" Zackel managed to say.

"True, true…" The Forsaken guard said, scratching at his rotten nose. "But considering the, you might say, exceedingly _atypical_ nature of how you and he emerged, well…it's quite _feasible_ that we could _misunderstand_."

Zackel swallowed again, and wondered if he could get one decent spell off before the numbers caught up to him. Considering more Forsaken guards, including an abomination, were approaching with interest, even getting one spell off seemed to be becoming more remote.

"…If you are capable of _purposely _misunderstanding his request, then you already likely know what it really is. I'd also like to note that harming me could damage this portal, and believe me, any enjoyment you get out of it will not make up for what the orc will do to you." Zackel said.

"You enjoy the sound of your own voice, I can tell." The Forsaken guard said. "Let me tell you something, human. The dead have little use for talk."

"But you're not truly dead, are you?" Zackel said.

From the way the Forsaken's eyes narrowed, Zackel immediately realized he'd said the wrong thing.

"Wait wait! Don't misunderstand! That's not an insult…!"

"If you were in my shoes, mage." The Forsaken guard said. "You'd see just _why _I consider you wrong."

Zackel wasn't quite sure how to respond to that, and in the end he didn't have to, as the portal crackled behind him and Prigak re-emerged. To Zackel's mild surprise and alarm, he came with just one other: his mate Krihina, who was walking, albeit supported by Prigak. The duo paused a second, as if confirming they were actually in the Undercity, and then Prigak turned towards the Forsaken.

"Where is the requested aid!? I gave you more than enough time!"

"Hold your horses orc. She's here." The Forsaken guard said, as a female Forsaken in a white robe emerged from the crowd and approached Krihina. The two began a discussion that was too low for Zackel to hear, as two more Forsaken, both male, followed the female in the white robe with a stretcher. Krihina waved the stretcher off and began to walk, before a stumble forced the female Forsaken to grab her before Prigak could. Said Forsaken continued to talk quietly to the orc, even as Zackel watched Prigak's darkly concerned features and tried to figure out what to say. In the end, he decided on the direct approach.

"We need to hurry warrior."

"What?" Prigak said, looking at Zackel.

"You and I need to go back through the portal, just long enough for me to get out of Tarren Mill. This doorway is secured, it will stay up another ten minutes at least…"

"Don't be idiotic human! I'm not leaving my mate's side!" Prigak said, turning away.

"Wait wait wait!" Zackel said, raising a hand. "You said that if I helped you as I promised, I'd go free! I carried out my end!"

"As have I, human. You _are _free, more or less. Unfortunately, circumstances force me to terminate the agreement at that." Prigak said, as Krihina finally settled fully on the stretcher and the two Forsaken began to carry her away under the female's orders. Zackel felt a chill run down his spine. The orc was abandoning him. No matter how understandable the circumstances, it didn't change that he'd essentially freed Zackel's leg from a trap and then not bothered to bandage the wound or deal with the predators who caught the scent of blood…

"Forsaken." Prigak said, speaking to the guards. "This human is to be escorted from your city. WITHOUT doing him harm. If it happens otherwise, you'd best hope I never hear of it."

That was the last thing Prigak said, and the suddenness of the words caused Zackel's eyes to follow him briefly as the orc hurried after his mate. Maybe he'd been too harsh. Despite the less-than-optimum circumstances Zackel was now in, Prigak had lived up to his end of the bargain (more or less, there were those words again). Considering Zackel was a stranger, and of the opposing side in a newly re-ignited Alliance/Horde conflict, and the problems with his mate's pregnancy, Zackel would have been foolish to expect much more.

Then Zackel's eyes turned to the Forsaken guards once more, and the chill returned at an even stronger intensity. Just how far away from optimal the situation was shone in the eyes of the walking dead, the same looks of inscrutable menace that Zackel had seen on Samba and Humbert and were also carried by every single one of the Forsaken who faced the mage.

And Zackel realized that, once again, Prigak's words could be twisted. The Forsaken could very well just bring him outside the city and have their way with him out there. Or bring him to one of the hideous laboratories that supposedly existed in the crypts that made up the Forsaken's capital and make him ingest or inject something that wouldn't take effect until later, until he was out of the city and technically not coming to harm inside it. Or maybe they'd just drag him away to whatever they wanted to do and claim he'd tried something and they were forced to retaliate. Fel, maybe Prigak would forget about him completely.

…Then again, maybe the Forsaken were just screwing with him, their idea of a practical joke. Maybe they'd listen to the orc's commands and do what was asked of them.

Zackel knew they weren't all, by nature, evil at the core.

But here…he couldn't be sure.

And hence, as he looked at them, he made his decision, as he let the second Rune of Portals drop down from inside the sleeve of his robes into his hand. He'd managed to palm it when he'd been tossed among Voidglare's artifacts after Darthalia's little 'test': fortunately for him, he'd had it there already, in case he'd needed it for the initial portal formation. His primary reason for grabbing it was to make sure the Forsaken on the other end didn't take it while he was gone, and he'd originally planned to use it on the other side to get to a safe location.

That plan had gone out the window when Prigak had abandoned him. Back through the portal was just another group of Forsaken who Zackel KNEW didn't like him. In front of him was an even larger group, albeit with unknown motives, but that wasn't good enough. Zackel didn't have enough time on either end to cast a new teleportation spell, even to an area he was attuned to, nor did he have enough magical power or skill to fight off his enemies.

That left one option.

"Shall we go?" The Forsaken guard asked.

"Yes. Let's." Zackel said.

And he turned and leapt back into the portal he'd come from, shoving his right hand in first…

As he crushed the Portal rune at the same time and whispered one single magical word.

In the Undercity, the Forsaken guards looked upon the sight with some surprise, before they moved to follow. In Tarren Mill, Darthalia and her fellow Forsaken saw the portal light up, and knew someone was coming.

What neither side knew was what Zackel had done, something Zackel had counted on and dearly hoped for.

Portals were unnatural creations: any mage worth their salt knew that. They were hard enough to establish, and you could not change their destination in mid-transport (and the few attempts there had been to do something like that had had rather…lamentable results). Hence, when mages were being taught to create them, they were also taught to not use any second or new Portal runes too close to them. If a Rune of Portals was triggered too close to an already established one, said portal would 'cannibalize' the energy released by the artifact, and since a portal couldn't be 'overloaded', and said portal had already been established and couldn't be 'improved', the wormhole would have no choice but to immediately vent the excess energy out through both ends of the gateway.

This was not a problem to the mage who had created the portal: _their _energy had been used to establish it, and a venting of an excess amount of it would, at worst, knock them down and give them a whole body sensation of pins and needles for a brief period of time.

To anyone else…the key word about a portal was _unnatural._ And no body reacted well to a sudden blast of _unnatural _energies.

The end result was the arcane surge that erupted out of the portal inside the Tarren Mill structure and the depths of the Undercity, to the Forsaken caught in it, felt like a giant hand had smashed them into the ground. And that was not the worst part for them. The worst part was eldritch power searing itself into their cells, momentarily paralyzing them and leaving them unable to move. Even as changed as the body of the undead were, they were similar enough to the living.

However, the Forsaken guards in the Undercity were not trained mages, and for all they knew, the explosion out of the portal had outright (re)killed their companions. Hence, the Forsaken behind the frontline guards in the Undercity immediately recoiled away from the magical attack, falling back and assuming a defensive position while calling for more reinforcements. By the time they realized their error, it was too late.

The Forsaken in Tarren Mill had no such luxury, for as potent as the portal wave was, it was also nearly silent. The four of them were completely alone in the building, with no indication given to the outside of what had happened and no ability to summon aid. They were left alone and motionless on the ground, unable to move anything but their eyes.

Zackel settled down on the floor inside the building, shaking his head to clear the buzzing noise. Glancing around to make sure all the Forsaken inside the building were disabled, Zackel quickly turned around and held out his hands.

"_Gallifrey.__"_

The portal collapsed on itself, the passageway between the Mills and the Undercity closing off and preventing any of the Forsaken there from following him. Zackel turned around quickly once more, making absolutely certain he hadn't miscalculated and that none of the Forsaken where he was were getting up. They weren't, but Zackel had no idea how long that would last.

It was time to get moving.

Zackel was saved the need to hunt for his gear: it was still on the same table he had seen before. Zackel quickly retrieved his bags and miscellaneous items and snatched up his staff, doing a quick sweep around the room to make sure he had everything. Finding nothing else, he turned back to the fallen Forsaken and walked over to them.

Black, naked hate burned in the eyes of the one called Darthalia. Zackel met the gaze, returning it with an impassive observation in turn. After several seconds, he raised his staff.

"If you remember anything, remember this. I am not you." Zackel said.

Zackel didn't say anything else, instead turning to one of the other things he'd observed before he'd been called upon to open the portal. The window in the back of the house. A gnome device allowed him to swiftly cut the glass from its panes and drop it onto the grass outside.

Zackel slipped out and immediately stole into the woods. After doing some examining of his compass, and some luck, he managed to double back on his steps and make his way to the road that passed by Tarren Mill, where he quickly plunged back into the opposing woods where he'd originally been captured. If he was lucky, his misdirection would last long enough for him to get away.

It did, as Zackel traveled through the woods and up the hills until he reached the Alliance Camp outside Alterac Valley.

If the Forsaken sent people in pursuit, he never saw them.

* * *

"And that…was pretty much it." Zackel said. "I gave the Forsaken a few days while I recuperated at the camp from my 'injuries', and then I set off to the Alterac Mountains again via a considerably longer route. Unfortunately, the camp didn't have the means to replace my Heathstone or my Runes of Portals. And since you left your Heathstone back at the Wintergrasp camp so enemy forces couldn't use it if you were captured…we're trapped here."

Rielle was silent. She'd been silent throughout the entire story, and her face had slowly grown to be as impenetrable as the Forsaken Zackel had fled from. Even Zackel's supposed finale hadn't changed it.

"…I should have gone back to Southshore and replaced them." Zackel said. "I should have swallowed my pride and faced the possible mockery that awaited me there. But after that…the whole experience was so unpleasant that I just wanted to forget it. If I went back there after my claims and the reaction to them…I'd lose my chance to do that. So I made excuses to myself that I didn't need them, and went off without them. So I was wrong, and stupid, and for that I'm sorry Rie…"

Rielle's hand was on Zackel's throat and yanking him up before he even realized the draenei had moved.

"More than you think." Rielle snarled, before she slammed Zackel into the wall so hard Zackel swore he felt it start to give, the shockwave of force paralyzing his body.

And the impact wasn't just physical. Zackel had expected that Rielle's blankness would reveal anger when all was said and done, but he was completely floored at just HOW angry Rielle looked. This wasn't her snapping, defiant anger or her force-to-knees-and-grovel kind. The cold fury that had suffused Rielle's face was simply, absolutely terrifying.

"…Rielle, wait…"

"No no no Zackel. Enough talk. Quite frankly I've had enough of my face being shoved into JUST HOW SOFT YOUR HEAD IS. I THINK IT'S ONLY MATCHED BY YOUR IDIOTIC HEART." Rielle hissed, her eyes burning.

"I-I-I-I didn't have a _choice!_ Surely you understand…!"

"I understand more than you realize. That's why I'M PISSED." Rielle raged. "I want you to think, Zackel. Think like you believe I can't. Think over all you did. Where the hole is."

Zackel stared incomprehensively.

"Like I said. IDIOT." Rielle snapped. "I could forgive _why _you don't have any Portal runes, or not dealing with those Forsaken while you were down. I could even forgive you not going back to Southshore because you were too _BRAIN-DEAD._ But you told the story hoping I wouldn't be bright enough to see where it all becomes bullshit…!"

"W-what?"

"You were RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE PORTAL! YOU HAD THE RUNE, YOU PICKED IT UP JUST BEFOREHAND! AND YOU WEREN'T STILL GROGGY AND DAZED!" Rielle yelled. "That orc took his dagger and attention off you! You could have crushed the Rune there, you said that overload would happen if the Rune was activated close enough, you could have whispered the word under your breath, and BOOM! The pulse would have paralyzed everyone inside the building right then and there, and you could have grabbed your things and run for it then! And I know _you _knew you could do that at the time, ZACK, DESPITE TRYING TO GLOSS OVER IT. I READ IT IN YOUR FACE."

Zackel had no reply, as Rielle pulled him in closer.

"Instead, you used your little trick when there weren't any other options. Instead of the first, and best time. So why didn't you, Zack? Why did you wait? What held you back? Tell me what I know drove you to not do it, mage, and don't lie to me. Don't you DARE lie to me."

"…If I'd done it then…I could have harmed the female orc. Caused her to…" Was all Zackel got out before Rielle turned and hurled/smashed him to the ground.

"Precisely. You acted in such a way to make sure the female orc got _proper medical care._ You put your neck on the line for _ONE OF THE THRICE-DAMNED HORDE._ Not because you had to. Because you _CHOSE_ to. You _WEERKUAY _BASTARD."

"Rielle, please…"

"DO YOU KNOW WHAT THE ORCS DID TO MY PEOPLE?! DO YOU?! _**DO YOU?!**__**"**_ Rielle nearly screamed. "You think you humans had it bad? Having one of your kingdoms destroyed? The orcs destroyed _OUR WHOLE WORLD. THEY MASSACRED MY PEOPLE. _They didn't just try and kill us, they tried to VIOLATE US. RUIN US. I DON'T GIVE A SHIT ABOUT ANY FEL CORRUPTION DETAILS!!! I WAS THERE! I WATCHED EVERYTHING I KNOW BURN, SUFFER, AND WITHER AWAY! I SPENT YEARS HIDING IN THE ZANGERMARSH WITH WHAT REMAINED OF MY PEOPLE, SPENDING EVERY WAKING HOUR IN TERROR AND EVERY SLEEPING ONE THINKING I MIGHT NEVER WAKE UP AGAIN! Do you really know what that's like, mage? DO YOU REALLY THING OUR SAINTED REPUTATION HAS HEALED ALL THE SCARS OF THAT TIME?! BECAUSE YOU WOULD BE DEAD _WEERKUAY WRONG!__"_

"Rielle…"

"And you claim to be my friend. You know so little, and yet…I let you…"

"Rielle, please! I didn't know you! I didn't know I'd meet you! How could I? You can't project current experience into the past, there's nothing down that route but pain and madness…!"

"Don't talk to me of pain. You're a child when it comes to pain. A child in all ways." Rielle said. "You don't understand the Horde. You don't understand why you should be regretting what you did, instead of just recounting it like you did a good thing, or the best available thing. You can't understand. I should have been able to tell that. From all I've seen of you, and all I've seen of myself."

"Rielle…"

"Is that why you keep drawing back? Keep giving me those horrified looks? Because you can't accept the fact that I consider the Horde barely a step above Arthas' legions?"

"…what?"

"Come ON, Zack. You think I haven't noticed all those weird zoned-out moments you've had? Where you stop seeing me, and just see…what you can't stand about me? You who thinks, so dearly WANTS TO THINK, that the Horde is just misunderstood and waiting for the right time when we can finally live in peace? Faced with the Draenei who knows the truth, a truth you both deny and despise, and in turn condemn me for it? You think you have the right to JUDGE MY HARD-EARNED EXPERIENCE, ASSHOLE?"

Zackel stared, at a complete loss. Rielle looked back for a few seconds before turning away.

"Tomorrow morning you go out there and you stay out there until you find a way to stop that storm. I don't care how long it takes. I'm done tolerating this and ignoring what's right in front of my face." Rielle said, as she kicked Zackel's furs over to him. "Better get some sleep now. You might not get any after."

Zackel looked down at the bedding, and when he looked back at the draenei she'd completely turned away from him, throwing wood on the fire before she knelt and stared at it. Zackel didn't need Rielle's skills in reading faces and body language to know she was still seething.

He wanted to go over to her, to try and find the words that would take back what had happened…and he knew if he did she'd probably break his jaw.

In the end, he had no choice but to try to go to sleep. It was a long time coming.

And as he finally drifted off, Zackel could swear he heard a mocking voice laughing at him.

* * *

_**I told you.**_

_**All the things you think you share, all those brief feelings…as insubstantial as the wind. Her true self is a seething ball of hate.**_

_**Just like the other. All you've seen, all you've recalled…you know it's true.**_

_**You will never have anything. The only thing she will give you is more things to lose.**_

_**Why did you sleep?**_

_**She could be planning to kill you right now…**_

_**Kill her.**_

_**Killer.**_

_**Kill…

* * *

**_

Zackel was aware of the hand on his shoulder as he surged out of sleep. He raised his own hand in turn.

And slammed it down on the floor, knuckles first. The old, familiar pain fully snapped him back to reality, and he whirled around to see the source of the touch.

"Yeesh. Even when sleeping you try and hurt yourself. How the fel did you live this long?" Rielle said, already walking away.

"Wha? Huh?" Zackel said, blinking.

"You were having a nightmare. Again. Soft-headed mage." Rielle said, settling back down by the fire. "Woke you up. Go back to bed, my words still stand."

"…Rielle?" Zackel said, as what had happened settled on him. Another nightmare. Another mocking whisper telling him supposed truths and inevitable acts. And Rielle still clearly feeling angry and betrayed.

Zackel watched Rielle for a second, before he put a hand over his face. The old familiar pain in his hand had brought a clarity he'd been lacking before.

Something was off. Zackel been too floored by the whole experience beforehand to realize it then, but on top of Rielle's incredible anger at Zackel's story…

_And wasn't it strange just how violently she'd reacted_

…Rielle had also indicated she'd drastically misunderstood something Zackel had done. She thought that his brief blackouts were due to disgust he felt towards her about the way she felt about the Horde, a conclusion she'd reached based on how Zackel had acted to try and save Krihina's life and had reacted to based on such.

She did not know the truth of said looks.

The truth that had haunted Zackel ever since that day.

In not knowing it, she had become furious at him, a rage that threatened, seemingly already had, to consume everything they'd made-

-and yet, when he'd clearly been in the grips of whatever nightmare he'd just had, she'd come over and brought him out of it. For all her anger…she'd done that.

If Zackel just did what she said, it might well, likely would be, the last act of kindness she ever showed him.

Unless he told her the truth. The whole truth. And faced whatever consequences it itself brought. For all he knew, everything was already broken beyond repair, and this would just set the wreckage on fire.

Or maybe…just maybe…

* * *

"What are you doing?" Rielle said, looking coldly at Zackel as he knelt down next to her. "Don't bother apologizing Zack. I don't want to hear it. Nothing you say is going to change what I've decided."

"…it's not…what I said…that is relevant here. It's what you said." Zackel said. "You talked about the moments I had, where I seemed to be looking at you and casting judgment. You thought it was because of what you believe about the Horde. It's not. It has nothing to do with you."

"Fine. Don't care." Rielle said, turning away.

"…………..I lied." Zackel said. "After what happened with Jasciona, I gave a spiel about how power changes you, and how I wanted to be careful with it and advance at my own pace…but that wasn't how I thought then. Back then, all I could think about was what my power, my magic, had cost me…and how after that, I wanted nothing to do with it. Instead of trying to find my own path, I curled up in a ball and tried to block the world out. Neglected my studies. Stopped adventuring with my friends. Maybe I was stupid in Hillsbrad, but that doesn't even begin to compare to my stupidity then. And what it ultimately cost me."

Rielle said nothing, but Zackel sensed that, maybe even despite herself, she was listening.

"Or rather, what it cost my brother."

With that, Rielle glanced at Zackel, though she remained silent. Zackel, feeling that speaking at the time would be a poor choice, also went quiet.

"…I don't recall you…mentioning a brother."

"I did. I just never specified who he was…it was easier that way. Easier to forget. To block it out." Zackel said, before sighing. "I've never told anyone this. Not my parents, not my teachers, no one. No amount of alcohol has ever come close to revealing…what happened the day that caused me to have those states that you thought was me condemning you. If we'd never met, I…might have never told anyone. But…you don't deserve that. You deserve to know why I did what I did. The whole truth. Whatever the consequences might be."

"Don't think this will change anything."

"Maybe not." Zackel said. "This is why I looked at you that way, Rielle. Not because of the Horde. Because of the Legion."

"…the Legion?"

"The day the Dark Portal opened." Zackel said. "The day the Burning Legion marched on Stormwind. The day I…failed Daldion."


	19. Why We Fight: Death By Degrees

Chapter 19: Death By Degrees

Writer's Note: So, _brilliant _review-greedy me threatened to pull a fanbrat and hold the story hostage for reviews…and I never realized I had neglected to turn anonymous reviews on until Etherdependant pointed it out. Whoops.

Well, that's changed, so if you anonymous readers wanted to review and were locked out before, that's not the case now. And now might be a good time to start. No more cliffhangers here. This time, we find out the whole story to Zackel's darkest day.

Let's begin.

* * *

"_What's that metronome I hear  
Perhaps the end is drawing near  
You never hear the shot that takes you down  
Now your dream's a memory, and seems more true from far away  
Just like smoke that fades and makes no sound  
Out of time  
So say goodbye  
What was yours  
Now is mine  
And I dream broken dreams  
I make them come true  
I make them for you."_

_Months before it all went wrong…_

"You're kidding me." Daldion said, currently positioned on Zackel's bed in his dorm room. "You nailed Jasciona?"

"Don't be so crude." Zackel replied, not looking up from the book of basic alchemical processes he was reading. "She's not a piece of metal to be applied to construction."

"Holy SHIT, bro. You can't fake that tone of yours. You ARE screwing her."

"If your own voice didn't indicate your apparent astonishment at that concept, your continuing vulgarity would remain irritating." Zackel said, finally looking up at his brother. People used to say that Zackel had gotten the brains of the pair, as Daldion possessed the more traditional rugged farm boy frame, unlike Zackel, who was only a few steps above 'stick-like', and Daldion could actually pull off a mustache and beard in the fashionable way many Azeroth human males wore it, while Zackel got a mutated version of 'peach fuzz' that he did his best to keep shaved off. There was also the fact that, growing up, Zackel had tended towards coming up with the plans and Daldion had tended towards being an or the important part in carrying them out (which also meant that Daldion tended towards being the one punished if he was caught, something that was rare enough that Daldion never resented it). Such an assessment was underdeveloped to say the least: Daldion was no dunce, and had displayed the same magical aptitude that Zackel had, albeit two years later then Zackel had (then again, since they'd both roughly manifested in the same time frame, Daldion tended to ignore that fact), which is why they were both in Maginor's Dumas' 'class'. True, Daldion tended towards more towards the physical part of life, and in relation to that, had seduced a considerable number more of young girls then his brother had, but Zackel hadn't spent all his time in his house reading books (just more time than Daldion), and while he could count his romantic and sexual conquests on one hand and still have a few fingers left over, he'd never come out of them with battle scars and a broken heart like at least two of Daldion's relationships had ended up. "Why is this so amazing? We've been seeing each other for six weeks now."

"Hey, you were the one who told me to hit the books. So it's YOUR fault that I didn't notice your secret, hidden relationship."

"I didn't say hit them so hard that they act like they hit you. And it's not secret nor hidden. Just reserved and private."

"That's the same thing!"

"When the day comes that you realize that's not the case, big brother…" Zackel said, turning a book page with his thumb. "Is the day when you might actually realize I'm seeing a classmate three or so weeks after everyone else did."

"Don't remind me." Daldion grumbled. "I say your mockery is baseless. Mainly because I think I've been doing more studying than sleeping lately."

"You're not alone."

"Yeah, but Kel…you're not the one on the Maginor's shit list."

"And neither are you Daldion."

"You keep saying that, but after Adaric…"

"Do you remember what the Maginor said on our first day? About how none of us were special?" Zackel said, looking up from the book again. "Do you know the difference between yourself and Adaric? You listened. Adaric never did. Fel, I think it was too late for him long before he got here. He refused to grasp any situation where he wasn't the blessed shining star, all because he was the only one in his village who could set things on fire with his mind. That's why he's gone. It's also why the Maginor is putting pressure on you. He's testing his assessment that you're worth keeping on. The fact that you were so absorbed in trying to keep up with the ones who have drawn ahead first tells me that he won't be proven wrong."

"You're just saying that because you're my brother."

"Our blood doesn't change its truth. Just keep doing what you're doing, Daldion. I can tell it won't get any easier. Having it tough to begin with will make sure you're still going when it kicks in for everyone else."

"Heh. There's that silver tongue of yours. No wonder _you _scored Jazz. I thought _I _was being nice and charming when I tried to get to know her, and she still blew me off. Nicely, but still…I was kinda worried in the four seconds a day I have for those things now that someone who looks that way might be…wasted, if you know what I mean?"

"Not really."

"Thought she might not like boys, you know? Nothing wrong with that, except, as said, it seemed like a waste."

"It's accurate though. She doesn't really like _boys._" Zackel said. "_Boys _drooled over her. _Boys_ thought she'd be a wonderful thing to say they'd had. _Boys _imagined the great pleasures _they_ could have with her. And that's why she's with me."

"Oh look at you, the big man now."

"No Daldion. I'm not a big man. You were always the big man in our family, in every way. I never begrudged you that. Mostly." Zackel said. "I didn't seek her out. The fact that she found that appealing, and what else I possessed moreso, well…what can I say?"

"Well, definitely one thing." Daldion said. "What's she like?"

"Superb observation wit. Reads even faster than me. Strangely she actually likes meat a lot, must be fuel for her brain…"

"No no, not that boring stuff." Daldion said. "The _fun_ stuff."

"Ah yes, the _fun stuff._" Zackel said. "That you'll never learn."

"Oh come on Zackel, we always shared this stuff."

"No, you mostly went on about how great you were and I did you a service by not calling you on any of it, and believe me, there were more than a few times I could have." Zackel said. "A lady does not kiss and tell, and this gentleman and scholar, hopefully, will not kiss and tell on his lady."

"How about a hint?"

"No."

"A concept?"

"No."

"An inkling?"

"No."

"A glimmer?!"

"No."

"So you sucked then."

"Yes Daldion. I sucked. My performance was so atrocious that I am still not going to give you any salacious details." Zackel said, returning his attention to the book. "I suggest you either return to your own studying or go off and seduce another barmaid based on how eager you are to hear private details about my privates and whatever interactions they might have."

Despite his downward gaze, Zackel was still able to dodge the thrown pillow his older brother tossed at him.

"I'll bet they're bright blue." Daldion teased, having gotten up after throwing the pillow to head out of the room.

"I never told you how to lay your wagers Daldion." Zackel replied, devoting his attention fully to his own studies.

_Some time later._

"What did you _DO?"_ Jasciona asked Zackel from where she was now lying on the bed, which happened to be behind Zackel as he sat in the same rough spot his brother had occupied a few hours ago.

"Either made him jealous or gave him an idea. Maybe a little of both." Zackel said, trying not to look at the wall and the faint noises of 'enjoyment' that were coming through it from the next room over. "Daldion was never one to do anything half-assed."

"What happens if the Maginor catches him?"

"My parents never could. Neither could any of THEIR parents. He really was a magician that way." Zackel said, trying to ignore the sounds. He was aware that Jasciona was moving behind him; moments later she slid her arms around his shoulders.

"So…jealous? Of us?" Jasciona said into his ear.

"Seems the most feasible possibility." Zackel replied.

"What did you tell him?"

"Nowhere near as much as he would have liked. Which in this case was nothing at all."

"You're sweet, you know that Kel?"

"I do my best." Zackel replied, leaning back so Jasciona's face was parallel to his and leaning slightly against it, closing his eyes at the feel of her cheek against his. "Though I suspect he's doing HIS best to annoy me with this."

"Want to _REALLY_ give him something to compete with?"

"Unless he's somehow turning you on, which I think I have valid reasons to doubt, I'd rather study and go to bed early, and wake up refreshed and ready on a day we have classes. Besides, I'd probably make you break the windows."

"You bad boy." Jasciona teased.

"The worst."

* * *

_Then._

Everything had changed since then. The room. The lighting. The man. The only remote similar thing was the position Zackel was in, sitting on his bed in the dark.

Said dark abruptly vanished as the door was violently shoved open. The motion that Zackel made with his head to observe whoever had entered was so slight as to be virtually undetectable.

"…you know, I kind of halfway hoped I'd find this room empty." Daldion said.

"Afraid I have to disappoint you." Zackel said, his gaze flicking back towards the wall.

"All right Zackel, enough of this shit." Daldion said, marching into the room and igniting the torches on the wall with one brief, sweeping gesture. It said something that Daldion's dirty, food stained robe and tangled sweaty hair and beard somehow looked better than Zackel's faded clothing and confusing hair. Normally, Zackel and Daldion had the same brown hair color: Zackel had magically enchanted his to look blue for a reason he'd never revealed. It was clear that Zackel had not renewed the enchantment in some time, hence leaving his hair a strange mix of muted blue and brown, the magical equivalent of a cheap dye job with one's roots showing. "You need to knock it off, right now."

"…this isn't a bad habit Daldion…"

"BULLLLLLLLSHIT! This is worse then some of the people I've seen zonked out on bleem!" Daldion said, walking over to Zackel. "I have been…Zackel look at me."

Zackel did not respond.

"LOOK AT ME, DAMN YOU, OR I SWEAR TO THE LIGHT I WILL SET YOUR HAIR ON FIRE."

"…I did not ask for your patience." Zackel said, looking up.

"You don't have to." Daldion said, sniffing the air. "Ugh. How long has it been since you've eaten real food?"

"I'm making do."

"You smell like straw soaked in Fulbolg urine. Didn't you listen when the Maginor told us about the problems of only eating manifested food?"

"I'm. Fine." Zackel said. "I'm not near the danger area…"

"No, you've passed it, if someone like YOU has come to THIS." Daldion said. "Damn it Zackel, what the fel are you trying to prove?"

"Nothing. I'm working on a problem…"

"THE HARDEST PROBLEM I EVER SAW YOU FIGURE OUT TOOK YOU FOUR DAYS! YOU'VE BEEN LIKE THIS FOR WEEKS!"

"It's a considerably more troublesome problem." Zackel said, dropping his head down again. Daldion narrowed his eyes.

"She wasn't worth it Zackel."

"That's not the issue…"

"I stopped buying that line of shit a long time ago brother. It's about time _you _follow suit." Daldion said. "I know that you loved her, bro, and I know that she turned out to be a bitch…"

"That isn't what…"

"Cram it. Whatever she and you turned out to be, I know that you weren't as experienced with your interactions with the fairer sex as I was. I thought this might happen some day…just didn't expect it to be Jasciona to do it to you." Daldion said, crossing his arms. "So I gave you your space to mope and angst. And that's ending right now. Get over it Zackel."

"No."

"…_what?_"

"I said, no." Zackel said, glancing up again. "I will not _get over_ anything, because this isn't a matter of getting over _anything._"

"Bullsh-"

"Yes, yes, bovine excrement. I've thoroughly grasped your opinion." Zackel said. "This isn't about what happened between Jasciona and me. It's about what happened to her, and how it relates to me."

"Yeah, it's called 'She came back with a superiority complex.'"

"It wasn't just _THAT, _Daldion, or we wouldn't be having this conversation to begin with." Zackel said, a tone of venomous inflection creeping into his voice. "It changed her. And not just in terms of ego. It was like her whole concept of registering things just _shifted_ to a degree I never would have thought possible. I didn't think she had that sort of thing in her, Daldion. I STILL don't, even after all the 'moping' and 'angsting' you claim I've been doing. She changed, Daldion. And until I figure out just how, and until it relates to her, myself, and our magical talents…I'm staying right here."

Zackel turned around, leaning his legs over the other end of the bed.

"So just show yourself out."

"…you really have forgotten, haven't you?" Daldion said. "That promise we made to ourselves."

"You mean in regards to why we enrolled in the Maginor's school? After those gnolls sacked our home?" Zackel said. "No. But Westfall's not the same as it was a year ago Daldion. Van Cleef's dead, likely, the Defias have had their back broken, and you and I personally saw to exterminating or driving out who knows how many gnolls. Not to mention those mercenaries we paid to stay on site…"

"Not that part, Zackel. The part on how we would make sure it wouldn't happen again. Not just by our actions, but by our developments. You were the one who said we shouldn't rest on our heels, for crying out loud! If it wasn't for you, I'd probably have settled back down there and started charming the farm girls again!"

"I'm not stopping you from your wanderlust Daldion. And your ambition is your own. Just like mine was, and how it needs to be…"

"You think this is ambition, Zackel? Locked up in an inn room, brooding over the same things day in and day out? You'll never find an answer in here, Zackel. And I know deep down you know it. That all these excuses you're giving is just so you can sit here and feel sorry for yourself." Daldion said, walking around the bed. "I am not just telling you as your brother, and your friend, and your partner. I am telling you, as a fellow mage, that the answer you seek does not exist, because you are lying to yourself about the question. And after all the shit we went through, I sure as fel am not letting you squander your talent and throw away your dreams just because some girl decided she was 'above' you. So, one last time. GET. UP."

Zackel didn't even bother raising his head. Daldion tightened his fingers on his staff so hard his knuckles turned white.

"Don't do this man. You're better than this."

"…you are entitled to your option." Zackel said. He did not look at Daldion as he spoke.

For a second, Daldion's eyes briefly moistened with sorrow before they returned to their hard, flint-like state. With a snort, he headed towards the door, stopping in its frame.

"You know, some people seemed to wonder why I wasn't jealous of you. I never gave them an answer, because quite honestly, I never really had one to give." Daldion said. "Now I do."

With a snap of his fingers, the torch lights extinguished, and Daldion slammed the door and left Zackel alone in the dark.

The mage's only response, after a bit, was to put his hand to his face and let the black settle back onto him like it belonged.

* * *

As deep and all-consuming that Zackel felt his torment was, like all pain it did not affect the world around him, only his own. The world, as it was want to do, moved on.

Towards larger things.

"Awwwww no." Silonna Slightedge said as Daldion walked down the stairs alone, the gnome running a hand through the upright flare of bangs she had above her head, a nervous gesture Daldion had come to know well.

"Let's go Silonna. The moron's decided he'd rather sit on the pot and be a miserable, stupid shit instead of the brother I knew. Until he gets off it, the Nether can take him." Daldion said, walking past the gnome. She sighed and hopped off her chair, tossing a few silver down for her drink as she did so, the pair exiting the tavern and heading out into the streets of Stormwind.

Across said streets, people went about their daily lives. Adventurers strolled around, interacted, planned, plotted, and amused themselves. Craftsmen sold their arts, trainers demonstrated their skills, and children ran throughout the streets and buildings, enjoying the brief time in their life when there would be no responsibilities.

And all of them saw it when the dimly lit blue sky above them abruptly darkened to a hellish red.

"By the light, what…?" A random guard said.

The black clouds appeared to swirl out of nowhere, but that was not what drew the attention of the guards manning the front Stormwind gates. That was solely taken by the snarling vortex that tore open in front of the city.

The monster that stepped out seemed bigger than the world. His footstep shook the ground, and the trees and grasslands around him immediately burst into flame, animals fleeing in a blind panic both from the fire and from his presence. Most of the guards who saw him were rooted to the spot: nearly all of them had experience with demons and the Burning Legion, to some degree, but few had ever seen the terrible sight of an elite doomguard, and it froze them with terror.

Until he roared, a sound that seemed to tear through all present like it was a blow in and of itself.

"_**AT LAST! THE LEGION SHALL FINALLY REIGN SURPEME OVER THIS WORTHLESS BALL OF MUD!"**_ Highlord Kruul bellowed. _**"CRY AND SCATTER MORTALS! THE PORTAL IS OPENED, AND YOUR END IS AT HAND!"**_

With one thrusting motion, Kruul raised his hand to the sky, and from the dark clouds above Stormwind, masses of green burning rocks erupted, falling down onto the city below, crushing and incinerating whatever they landed upon in a terrible blast of fel fire. And that was merely the beginning, as the rocks promptly animated and rose up in destroying bodies, the Infernals immediately beginning to seek out further life to destroy. Caught completely off guard, the magicians of Stormwind were unable to respond to the simultaneous opening of several other portals within the city, from which streamed felguards, voidwalkers, dreadknights, and more. With a grin that could stop hearts, Kruul lowered his hand and began thundering towards the beleaguered city.

"CLOSE THE GATES!" Went up the cry, as the frontline Stormwind guards frantically attempted to recover and defend their home and themselves. They acquitted themselves admirable, but far too late. With a gesture, Kruul sent ripping bolts of dark power that tore the numerous guards still exposed on the wall apart. The better-concealed ones were only able to partially close the gigantic wood barricades before Kruul reached them. It only took three blows from his massive sword to smash said gates to rubble.

"_**AZEROTH HAS COWERED TOO LONG UNDER OUR SHADOW! NOW, FEEL THE POWER OF THE BURNING LEGION, AND DESPAIR!"**_ Kruul roared as he pushed his way through the ruined barricades, before crushing an unfortunate guard with one brutal stomp. "_**YOUR FATE IS SEALED! I WILL FIND THE ASPECT SHARDS, AND THEN YOU WILL NOT…!"**_

The blessed arrow impaled itself right into Kruul's eye, and he staggered back with another roar. The offending object was swiftly expelled and the wound healed, but the fact that Kruul had been hurt was enough for him.

Much to his annoyance, said arrow was just the first, as several elves fully opened fire from their positions across the bridge. Kruul bellowed and returned fire, but the elves were quicker on their feet than the guards and quickly took cover behind the stone statues that decorated the Valley of Heroes. Even as the dust settled from their evasive efforts, General Marcus Jonathan drew his horse up at their end of the bridge.

"FALL BACK TO THE SECONDARY GATES! SUMMON ALL GUARDS! ORGANIZE THE ADVENTURERS! IF THEY WANT THIS CITY, THEY'LL HAVE TO GO OVER ALL OUR CORPSES!" Jonathan shouted above all the din, even as he drew his own gigantic blade. "FOR THE LIGHT! **FOR THE ALLIANCE!!!!"**

"_**PATHETIC INSECT!"**_ Kruul snarled as Jonathon charged across the bridge at him. As Kruul discovered, his assessment was not very accurate, as the general of Stormwind leapt from his horse and attacked Kruul with a fury that matched the doomguard's own.

* * *

The initial thundering rumble made Zackel look up.

"…Daldion if you're…"

The secondary one shook the inn so hard it hurled Zackel right off his bed. That, and the immediate sound of screams, made it quite clear that whatever was happening, Daldion was not the cause of it. Zackel quickly sprang to his feet and ran for the window in his room: due to how well he'd sealed it, it took him several seconds longer than normal to throw it open.

Before him, Stormwind was in flames. For another few seconds, Zackel stood in the window, unable to believe what he was seeing. He had been too young to remember the First War and the orcs marching on the human's mighty city, but history seemed determine to repeat itself right before Zackel's quivering eyeballs.

"Oh dear Light…" Zackel whispered, before he slammed the window shut. For half a second, his brain entertained the crazy idea of hiding under his bed covers and hoping that everything would just go away.

The thought vanished even as new light illuminated the room, summoned by Zackel's waving hand as he re-ignited the torches. With that done, the mage hurried over to the desk where he'd kept his belongings, frantically trying to both get them on his person and look through them. Zackel's skilled fingers managed to locate what he wanted after another few seconds' search, and he quickly downed his elixirs of Frost Power and Wisdom in one gulp each and hurled the vials aside as he tried to get his cast-off protective clothing on.

Another blast shook the inn, nearly causing him to fall flat on his just took advantage of that to get his shoes on before springing back up, strapping his bags to his person as best he could in the several seconds he allowed himself to do it before grabbing his gnarled wooden staff. Three seconds' chanting aligned all the protective and power-amplifying enchantments on the clothing, and Zackel headed for the door.

He managed to get down the stairs without tripping over his feet again, and promptly found a few other adventurers clustered in the tavern, along with several other 'normal' people, likely the location's employees, cowering behind the bar counter.

"…only likely safe place…!" The dwarf was saying before he jerked his head towards Zackel. "Ach, don't do that lad!"

"Sorry."

"You look like you can fight! Good!" The dwarf paladin said, turning back and stabbing his finger on a map. "We're heading for Stormwind Keep with these people! If you have a better suggestion you'd best say it now!"

"Well I am a little…" A human apparent-rogue said, before the door to the tavern exploded open. The people behind the bar shrieked as the felhound stormed in, seizing onto the closest target, that being a night elf female, and barreling straight towards her.

It met the elf's lover first, as the druid slipped around the female priest and transformed into a bear, crashing down on the felhound's body in a snarl of teeth and claws. Briefly pinned, the felhound was only able to emit one brief shriek of rage before the dwarf followed the druid, crushing the demonic creature's head with his glowing hammer.

"Yae' were sayin'?" The paladin said to the rogue.

"This building is made of wood, worthless as a defense. We need stone, and magically hardened stone at that." Another female said, this one human and dressed in dark red robes. The dwarf paladin gave her a withering look, like he wished she would disappear: the female warlock no-sold his expression. "I am ON YOUR SIDE, Dwarf. I do not serve these butchers! I will do everything in my power to turn them back!"

"See that ya do." The dwarf paladin said, his armor glowing with holy sigils. "Elf, with me at the front! Druid elf that is! Priest, right behind us! Mage, both of you, you'll follow after the people! Rogue, warrior, warlock, you bring up the rear! I'm sorry I don't know your names but I don't have the time to learn them!" The dwarf paladin said, gesturing for the normal people to follow them as he'd laid it out.

"A frost mage, right?" The gnome that was suddenly next to Zackel said, causing him to start. "Excellent! You set them up, I'll knock them down!"

"…okay." Zackel said, as he tried to get his game face fully on. Nearby, the female gnome warrior finished running the enchanted stone down her sword and pocketed it, swinging the two-handed weapon that was bigger that she was a few times before gesturing to the pair of mages to get ahead of her.

The group didn't have to go far to find trouble: no sooner had they stepped out of the tavern/inn when an infernal loomed out of the smoke and stormed towards the group. The dwarf paladin charged forward, hurling a wedge of gleaming power into the Infernal and drawing its attention, even as the two night elves fired off their own particular form of distance abilities. Zackel added his efforts to theirs, manifesting ice inside the infernal's stone body and causing instant steam explosions that tore through its rocky form. A blast of arcane missiles from the gnome mage and a few swings from the dwarf paladin finished the job.

"Is that the BEST they have at offer?" The paladin spat.

"INCOMING!" The warlock yelled, pointing up at the roof.

"You just HAD to say something didn't you." The rogue said, and then vanished from sight as the two felguards crashed down from above. With a swift gesture and an unpleasant sounding word, the warlock lanced out with her own power and struck one, freezing it in place even as the shadows beneath it began to draw it in. The gnome warrior charged at the other, meeting its axe with her sword and quickly slipping away before hacking at its legs. The felguard snarled, trying to hit the small target and leaving it wide open to the dagger that buried itself in its neck. Zackel gave the rogue a chance to escape from his sneak attack by firing a spear of ice into the felguard, and with two swift hacks the gnome warrior cut it off at the knees and then hacked its head off.

"We need to move, _FAST_. The whole city's swarming with demons. And there's one at the front so powerful it's giving me a headache from here." The warlock said, having successfully banished the Felguard.

"Accckkkh. Humans! You wouldn't see Ironforge caught with its skirts down!" The dwarf said.

"I'd like to see Ironforge again, in and of itself. Can we go please?" Zackel asked.

"Ah, just like it to be circumstance to rob me of a good fight." The dwarf paladin said, as he resumed the lead and heading towards the royal palace.

* * *

"_**YOU ARE NOTHING!"**_ Kruul bellowed, seizing up two Stormwind soldiers and hurling them through the air like they were dolls. As their bodies crashed down several streets distant, a female paladin smashed her mace into a anguisher succubus' side, slipping around and behind the demon as it curled up from the pain, grabbing it by the head and breaking its neck with one vicious yank. Eight guards furiously battled a dread lord, a dwarf priest standing behind them and shielding them from the demon's worse blows, as the mocking creature's taunts turned to screams as the guards overwhelmed and hacked it to pieces. A hunter and mage couple fired furiously at an encroaching infernal, and turned to run too late when its sweeping arm smashed both of them into a building. The priests and paladins marched forth as a unit from the Cathedral of Light, leading the orphans of Stormwind and their keepers to the safety of Stormwind Keep and incinerating any demon who was foolish enough to confront them with holy powers so intense they may have given Kruul pause. A bloody and battered General Jonathan was doing his best to accomplish that without them, as he leapt from the ramparts above Kruul and impaled his massive blade into the doom guard's shoulder.

And all across the city, the cries and screams continued…

"What's going on…!"

"Legion is here…!"

"Portal's opened…!"

"OH LIGHT MY BABIES…!"

"RUN FOR THE KEEP…!"

"THEY'RE COMING OUT OF EVERY SHADOW…!"

"EAT SHIT YOU STINKING…SHITS!" Daldion yelled, bringing a crushing rain of ice down on a pair of voidwalker's. One broke apart and disintegrated, but the other kept coming, its shadow hand reaching out towards Daldion.

A blast of fire from the mage blew the hand apart, and Daldion followed it up with another blast through the voidwalker's head. As it died, Daldion turned back to the other falling demon corpse, as Silonna perched on the demon's shoulder and rode the Felguard's body down, stabbing it in the head all the way. Even after they'd landed, the gnome rogue rammed her dagger into its mess of a skull a few more times. Just to be sure.

"Your insults are slipping Daldion." Silonna said, producing a bottle of her most potent toxin and quickly re-applying them to her blades. Despite what some holier-than-her types had told her about her choice of profession and combat tactics, it turned out that sticking a knife covered with poison into most demons managed to cramp their style as much as any Holy Light could.

"Why waste good material on-ARGGGHHHHH!" Daldion screamed, as the whip both tore into his back and hurled him forward onto his hands and knees. Silonna's eyes widened, and she scampered over to Daldion's side, daggers at the ready. The anguisher succubus laughed, raising a hand to bring the female gnome under her spell.

Before the bear came down on her back, smashing the demon into the dirt before she knew what hit her. The creature barely had time to scream before the bear's gigantic maw closed on its skull, ripping the succubus' head right off in one swift, powerful jerk.

"Eep." Silonna said. "Everything _is _worse with bears."

"Not when they're on our side." Zackel said, appearing from behind the druid.

"Zackel!" Silonna said. Whether Daldion had already been turning around before or Silonna saying his name did it, Zackel didn't know, but he noticed a distinctive jerk of surprise at the realization that Zackel was here. The mage watched his brother's eyes give him a brief up and down, before the night elf priest knelt by his side and healed the wound the succubus had inflicted on him.

"You know, it doesn't say much that what finally gets you off your ass is the end of the thrice-damned world." Daldion said, pushing himself up.

"We can debate later. Let's go guys. Keep's not far." Zackel said, as Daldion and Silonna joined the cluster of adventurers and civilians, the group heading towards the fallback position.

Not even the warlock among them noticed the presence in the dark, as a slight, cruel grin split its features.

"What you want comes at the strangest times."

* * *

Stormwind burned…but it was not the first time it had suffered in such a way. And as the demons of the Dark Portal had begun to find out, it had not gone without learning from its past.

For all his power, Kruul found himself stalemated on the bridge in the Valley of Heroes, unable to break through the ranks of the guards and adventurers who had charged to meet him there and who refused to give an inch. Despite the sudden attack catching them off guard, the mages and warlocks of Stormwind who served the side of the Alliance had recoiled twice as fiercely, as they began to close and seal the portals that had opened around Stormwind, cutting off the demons' reinforcements. The Deeprun Tram had been sealed off on Stormwind's side to prevent it from being damaged or used, and on its tracks rode Stormwind's own reinforcements, in the form of several regiments of Magni Bronzebeard's finest soldiers and all the adventurers who had been in Ironforge that had managed to be gathered up. If Stormwind could hold out until they arrived, than the tide could turn.

But until they arrived seemed like an eternity, especially for those in Stormwind who could not defend themselves. The possible cry of one carried on the wind to the cluster making its way up the canal, causing the dwarf leading them to stop in his tracks.

"Netherspit." The paladin cursed, looking towards the Dwarven District. "We can't pick up any more…but…"

"I shall go there and search myself." The night elf druid said, splitting away from the front of the group. "We are almost to the Keep. Escort these people to safety and return if you are able."

"Ack elf, you're not going alone!" The dwarf said. "Some of you best…!"

"I'll go with him." The female gnome warrior said.

"As will I." Daldion added.

"Me too." Zackel said, as Daldion turned to Silonna.

"I don't wanna hear it." The rogue said crossly. "Fine Daldion, I'll stay with these people. But if you get your stupid ass killed, find some other gnome to haunt."

"There's the charm I know and love." Daldion said, patting Silonna on the head before turning to follow the druid and warrior. "Come on Zackel! You owe it to me to keep up!"

"Believe me, I'm trying not to leave YOU behind." Zackel replied, as the dwarf started the group up again and hurried towards the Keep. Several steps later they met fierce opposition in the form of several Felhounds backed up by a dreadknight, and the adventurers once again found themselves in furious battle for their lives.

The flaming Dwarven District has its own dangers, in the form of several Infernals. Unfortunately for the eldritch constructs, though, they found that where one frost mage utilizing ice manifestation to create steam explosions was troublesome, two was overwhelming, as Zackel and Daldion did their own particular form of ham-stringing on the creatures before the druid and warrior finished them off. The greatest difficulty of their tasks came in protecting the straggling civilians the group picked up from the shrapnel that tended to result from the choice of tactics, but the foursome did their jobs well in that regard in turn.

And during the whole time, Daldion tried not to voice the nagging feeling he was having. Zackel was backing him up admirably, but his efforts overall seemed…off. Exactly why, Daldion couldn't say. It wasn't just Zackel being out of practice, though that was clearly part of it. It was something else. But, unable to pin it down, Daldion kept quiet and hoped it was simply a small bump in the road that his brother would take back to normalcy.

Provided they didn't all die.

Later, Zackel would wonder if such feelings had been an omen.

"…I can't smell any more." The druid said several minutes later, having stood on his hind legs in bear form to sniff the air before lowering himself back down to all fours. "This whole city reeks of fel energy, it deadens my senses…"

"Then let's accept what we have and get out of here." The gnome warrior said. The druid gave the small creature a look, which earned him a pointing finger. "I DON'T LIKE IT EITHER! But we can't keep running in circles, not any more! We've spent too much time doing it already!"

"…may Elune and Cenarius forgive me, and protect those we may have missed." The druid said grimly, turning back towards the exit of the Dwarven District.

"You heard the bear, let's go. Come on!' Daldion said, guiding the several people and two children the group had managed to locate back stone semi-tunnel/rampart that led to the canal and hopefully to the safety of the Keep beyond it. The druid went first, all senses alert for any ambush, as Zackel and Daldion watched for threats on the other end. Once all the people were through, the gnome warrior stepped in after them, forming a blockade on each end of the rescued civilians.

"Give us eight seconds, then follow." The gnome said, turning towards the people as she hurried them along.

"You know, you owe me for all the money I spent to make sure you didn't get kicked out of that inn." Daldion said.

"What? I paid my own fare."

"…you did?" Daldion said. "OH THAT LOUSY SON OF A…"

That was as far as Daldion got, as the lance of black power streaked overhead and smashed into the stone framework above the wizards. The gnome warrior whirled around in shock as the entranceway she'd just gone through collapsed, sealing off the mages from herself and the druid.

"What happened?!" The druid yelled.

"Trouble!" The gnome said, as she felt a rock fall from above her and barely miss her. The hit had been hard, and the tunnel was still collapsing. "We gotta go!"

"What about the mages?!"

"They're on their own!" The gnome warrior said, and as dirty as it made her feel inside, turned to fully retreat.

* * *

"Son of a bitch…!" Daldion cursed, pushing himself up from the prone state the exploding bolt of fel energy and its shockwave had forced him into, Zackel doing the same beside him.

"Now, that's no way to talk about your mother, as inferior as she might have been…" Spoke a voice that Zackel had almost forgotten, and he looked up with narrowed eyes at the figure before him. The dark brown hair, different from Daldion's chestnut color, had thinned some, and the baby fat had finally disappeared from the young man's youthful features, but both Zackel and Daldion recognized him. Even dressed in midnight black and with a staff that held a glowing eye on one end that seemed disturbingly organic.

"Well well well. The Jude brothers." The warlock said. "Fancy meeting you here."

"Adaric." Daldion said with a snort. "You know, part of me wants to say I'm surprised to see you here like this…"

"Surprised? At how I've shown just what an idiot our so-called teacher was?!" Adaric yelled. "He rejected me! Cast me out, said I would never amount to anything! He KNEW I would be too strong for him! And he was _right._ I didn't need HIM, or his LESSONS. I have found TRUE power, among the truly mighty. You see it all around you! The Legion tears your city down, stone by stone! They are the greatest force in the universe! I _always _belonged among them, not you!"

"Teacher wanted you to learn humility, jack-hole. It sucks, but it's worth it." Daldion said. He glanced at his brother, who was strangely silent and giving Adaric a look Daldion couldn't identify, though he was clearly alert and aware what was going on. "Me, I always sort of guessed that you'd end up a bad seed. Ever since you tried to spike that drink of mine because that girl in the park ignored you."

"I am beyond all such things now, Daldion." Adaric said, raising a staff. "You are nothing to me. I have come here to show you that, once and for all. You will be crushed beneath my power. I, Adaric Seethelord!"

"…you ever notice how it's the EXCEPTIONALLY stupid ones who announce their names like we care?" Daldion said, and hurled a blast of ice at Adaric. The warlock deflected it with a gesture, only to swiftly find out that said attack was a distraction from the follow-up ice rain from above.

"Help me out here Zackel! He might be a moron but he wasn't weak!" Daldion yelled, looking at his brother. "What are you doing? HELP!"

"Something's wrong…can't say what but…" Zackel said. He'd had a nagging feeling from the moment he'd seen Adaric, and it had grown to overwhelm him. Hence, despite Daldion's earlier observation that Zackel had seemed all right, he now found that his assessment might have been premature, as Zackel was reacting to his brother's attack with stunned surprise instead of immediate reinforcement.

"SAVE IT! GET-_**FLAGLOR!**_" Daldion rasped, before grabbing at his throat. Zackel's eyes widened, and he turned to face Adaric…as what felt like a steel-toed boat rammed in his own throat. He attempted to curse, only to find the words that came out of his mouth did not match the words in his brain. They were dark and ugly, and they made his throat ache more then the initial blow had. The same nonsense was spilling out of Daldion's mouth, before the sound of Adaric's laughter reached them.

"You see? With one curse, I seal your magic away!" Adaric cackled, having escaped Daldion's attack with just a few gashes. "You are not worthy of dying at my hands, pathetic mages! I will show you the path of true might, and call down your doom from the powers I serve! _**RASSALON…!"**_

Zackel's eyes widened as Adaric began to chant his dark words, crushing a strange crystal in his hand and scattering the dust around him. The whole situation wasn't just bad: it was strangely, terribly familiar…

Hands seemed to appear from nowhere, tearing the air apart behind Adaric, a seething void looming behind him…

And the pieces clicked together.

"_This whole city reeks of fel energy…"_

"_Snarljaw didn't understand the nature of his power. By attempting a dual summoning ritual, he caused too much dark energy to gather in one place at once. It empowered the demons…"_

"_The nature of the warlock is the same as the mule with a blade. Perhaps it can use it to do harm, but it does not understand it and will likely just as easily do harm to itself…"_

"…_reeks of fel energy…"_

"…_too much dark energy…"_

Despite himself, Zackel tried to scream at Adaric, warn him that what he was doing was beyond dangerous, that with the sheer amount of evil power that was drenching Stormwind, that his summoning process was going to be far stronger than he expected and would call something far worse than he desired…

He never got the chance, as the portal to the Nether erupted, hurling Zackel and his brother off their feet, the terrible radiance briefly blinding Zackel. He scrambled to one knee, hearing Adaric's delighted laughter in his ears even as he tried to get his eyes back.

"Wonderful! My, you are a unique one. I cannot say I've ever seen a…"

"_SILENCE MORTAL."_

To Zackel, it was like someone had rammed a red hot nail into his ear, and then dragged it across his head and directly down his spine. The voice spoke with a tempered malice so refined and pure that for a second Zackel thought he was going to pass out. From the grunt he heard Daldion make, his brother was experiencing almost exactly the same thing.

"Hold it demon! I called you here! You must…"

"_You did. That earns you nothing, SAVE THIS."_

"Wait NOOOEAIIIEAYIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!!" Adaric shrieked, a sound that was positively peaceful compared to the speaking voice.. Mixed with the scream was a ripping wet noise, and then another blast of heat, somehow even fiercer then all the surrounding fire and chaos, slammed into Zackel's body, causing him to recoil, holding his hand up in front of his face, even as his sight finally fully returned.

"Zackel…" Daldion whispered.

"Yeah. I know." Zackel said, lowering his hand.

Adaric was gone. All that remained of him was a blackened skeleton, impaled on the barbed, curved sword that swiftly tossed the smoking bones away. And with that, Zackel saw her entirely.

In size, she was not much larger than the two mages, but in sheer malefic presence she towered over them. Her skin was cast in the purple-red tone of an infected wound, her armor a brilliant shining scarlet in contrast. The ground beneath her hooves smoked, even as arcs of red power shot between the upturned horns that swept up from her forehead. Her eyes shone molten green, an unnatural sheen that seemed to mock the concept of the Emerald Dream and the nature of life, each side of each eye marked with small, sharp spikes.

She looked at the mages, and she smiled. Her lips were as red as blood, and her grin, filled with jagged teeth, was like the gates of the abyss opening wide to claim them, body, mind, and soul.

"At last. After so long kept away." The eredar said. "Rejoice, mortal scum. You shall experience a truly exquisite death. Such is the desire of Zuijizra The Blaze."

* * *

_The dryness in Zackel's throat could no longer be ignored, and he took a long, deep drink from the flask next to him. Rielle said nothing. She had not said, or looked at him, during the entire story so far._

"…_I had never seen an eredar before…"_

_Rielle's hand jerked up, causing Zackel to recoil. But she did not strike or grab him, instead just holding her hand up. Zackel blinked, waiting for the meaning._

"…_Man'ari." Rielle whispered. "The eredar are dead. Dead and gone and never coming back. All that remain…are the man'ari."_

"…_you would know." Zackel said. "I…had never seen a man'ari before. I had heard…some vague details about them. Even so, I knew then. Knew we were facing something beyond our ability to handle. I…"_

_Zackel looked briefly into the faint flames of the fireplace._

"_I…I failed anyway. In all ways."

* * *

_

"…well." Daldion said grimly. "Look at this, brother. One of those succubae actually seems to have made something of herself."

"Don't even _begin_ to equate me with those whorespawn, vermin." Zuijizra said, cocking her head slightly. "I am the chosen elite of our lord Sargaras, the spearhead of destiny he will plunge into the heart of all worlds and lifeforms. The encroaching burn of chaos…"

"Really? Well, I must admit you certainly look like you have some idea of that." Daldion said. "I must beg a question of you though. If you're the burning encroachment of spears or whatever you said, what are you doing sneaking in through a warlock's portal? The way you present yourself, you should be on the front lines."

"I would rather not trouble myself with the responsibilities. Not when there's so much fun to be had." Zuijizra said, flashing her terrible grin. "It's been too long since I've heard the delightful tone of blistering flesh."

"Is tone the right word? Personally I'd use cadence. No offense." Daldion replied. Zackel looked at his brother, part of him barely able to believe what he was doing.

The other part knew perfectly well. It was the same snappish banter and mockery both he and Daldion had grown up using on each other, anyone they didn't like, and later, those that would oppose them. It was a good release valve on the pressure of the situation, and could also double as a psychological weapon against the weaker-minded, who often took being insulted poorly even if they couldn't understand the design of said insults. Even as Zackel looked, he could see the ever-so-subtle shift in Daldion's stance that indicated he had expected Zackel to back him up with his exchange, even if it fell flat, and with Zackel having not done so, Daldion was compensating.

Normally, Zackel would have. He should have, if only to re-assure his brother he was still there…

Except he wasn't. All the instincts that Zackel had been honing in his adventures before Jasciona's return _had _grown soft during all his time spent brooding since, just as Daldion feared. But what Daldion had been unable to quantify was the fact that while Zackel had been able to get somewhat back on track during the initial attack and his efforts to help people, the way that the city was being overwhelmed with fel energy had been causing him a constant subconscious reminder of the event where everything had gone wrong in Zackel's life, leaving his return to normalcy on shaking ground.

Zuijizra's entrance had knocked him right back off it. Zackel's observations, rather then being at the forefront of his mind and its primary force, was instead part of a churning mass of terror, confusion, hopelessness, defiance, and understanding that there was nowhere to run and no way to go except through the man'ari before them.

And after a brief glance, Daldion finally knew it too. Mainly because despite their differing experiences, the same feelings were running through him.

The difference between Zackel and him despite this fact was about to become very clear.

"You believe yourself to be amusing. Idiocy." Zuijizra said, raising her sword. "The time for talk is done. The time for play…"

"Actually not interested in your game! Howaboutourseverplayball?!" Daldion yelled, and stabbed outward with his staff. And in doing so, Zackel realized that despite his inability to provide aid to Daldion as he'd wanted, the semi-blued haired mage had succeeded in at least one thing.

He hadn't looked up and given away Daldion's planned offense. Between all the smoke and ash in the air above Stormwind, and Daldion holding Zuijizra's attention by refusing to show his fear, he'd kept the man'ari eredar from seeing it as well.

For one final misdirection, Daldion fired a spear of ice when he thrust out with his staff. Zuijizra sidestepped it in one smooth motion, her eye-searing grin appearing on her face…

Which vanished when the spear was followed by a _sphere_, a massive ball of thick ice that Daldion had been forming above his head. Zackel goggled at the orb as it flew down towards the man'ari. It was a trick of Daldion's that he couldn't use very often, due to the time needed to form it and the problem of collateral damage. The last time Zackel had seen him use it, he'd thrown one the size of a horse.

This one was the size of a _house._ Daldion was like his brother in some ways, but he had never once feared his own power. The same fear that had so paralyzed Zackel now, in several ways.

Daldion knew it, perhaps. Whether he did or not, it didn't matter. Only survival did, as the ice orb smashed into the street and careened towards Zuijizra. Had she been one of the attacking Infernals, the sphere would have smashed her into a fine powder.

Zuijizra The Blaze was not.

The orb bisected in mid-air, an odd and unpleasant hissing snap sounding off the blow as Zuijizra carved the ice sphere in half with a strike from her blade, the orb flying by each side of her and smashing into the buildings. The attack hadn't even put a hair on her head out of place.

"Defiance never ceases to amuse me." Zuijizra said, still holding her sword up from the ascending blow that had disabled Daldion's effort. Only a moment of luck saved Zackel from what came next, as his eyes had been briefly drawn to the sword and managed to notice the blade was being turned in the man'ari's grip.

"MOVE!" Zackel screamed, leaping to the side as Zuijizra slashed her sword down. Anyone who might have been watching may have seen the black line that appeared on the road for the slightest moment before fire erupted up from its length, pelting Zackel with burning shards of rock. The pain brought him a brief moment of clarity, allowing him to scramble up and fired off a spear of ice of his own.

He had hoped that Zuijizra might be distracted in her attack. He was proven wrong, as Zuijizra slashed the spear out of the air and turned her eyes towards Zackel. With her gaze, the terror came back.

It also let Daldion act, as the mage thrust his staff towards Zuijizra.

"Killjoy."

The remains of Daldion's ice orb exploded, consuming Zuijizra in a storm of destructive hail. Daldion leapt up to his feet and ran to Zackel's side.

"Hey, Zackel! Move it! That won't last! We have to go! GOGOGO!" Daldion yelled, pushing Zackel towards where Zuijizra was. In retrospect, Zackel knew what the plan was: get around the man'ari and flee.

At the time, all Zackel knew was that his brother was trying to push him closer to the terrible creature, and his legs locked up, refusing to move.

"ZACKEL!" Daldion yelled, and then slapped his brother so hard that Zackel nearly fell down again. "MOVE! YOUR! ASS!"

"Yes, please do." Came Zuijizra's voice, and Daldion whirled around as the man'ari walked towards them, Daldion's hail storm shrugged off like all the rest of their offensive efforts. "Run. I enjoy the scent of futility as much as the smell of burning flesh."

"…If that's the case, why don't you give us a head start?"

"No." Zuijizra said, before slashing out with her sword again. Daldion yanked Zackel down, the building behind them exploding with fire, as Daldion counter-attacked with more blasts of ice. Zuijizra batted them away with her sword…and hence was completely caught off guard when Daldion switched up his offensive with a blast of arcane missiles, resulting in the man'ari taking the non-blockable attacks full in the face and chest and knocking her backwards. Daldion was running even before his attack had finished, trying to drag Zackel along. To whatever credit he could be given, Zackel only needed another second before his brain unfroze, and the pair sprinted around the man'ari…

And were both knocked sprawling by another explosive slash just missing them and ravaging the building behind them. Daldion was up first, blue energy surging from his staff and forming into a construct of ice, specifically a chain and a dense spiked ball that Daldion swung at Zuijizra's head. The spiked orb shattered across the Legion elite's horns and temple, actually making her take another step back.

"RUN! RUN! OR WE'LL BE WELL DONE!" Daldion yelled, pulling Zackel up as the pair tried to flee into the Dwarven District.

"Just done." Zuijizra said, raising her free hand as blistering green fire surged up on in before it was absorbed into her palm. She snapped her hand out, and the fel blaze run up her fingers and erupted outwards as a storm of explosive fire needles, blasting across the street and houses before her and causing them to erupt in flames.

One of the needles took Zackel square in the back, and he pitched forward onto his face with a yell. Daldion stopped to turn around, and promptly gone one of the explosive bolts in the knee and shoulder, throwing him backwards with his own yell. Feeling the unholy heat trying to devour his back, Zackel frantically summoned his power and managed to snuff the fire out before it could get through his magical protection. He began pulling himself up, looking at Daldion as he did the same, albeit not as fast.

The wicked laugh raked across Zackel's nerves, and he turned to look as Zuijizra began approaching them again, her sword perched over her shoulders.

"Bloody fel…" Daldion cursed. "Of all the things to end up at LOGGERheads with, brother."

Zackel blinked, having caught the inflection despite his mind's unhinged state. Standing up, he tried to simultaneously run and look around, only for Zuijizra to slash out with her sword again and cut off his escape route with another explosive wall of fire.

"So many kinds of flesh burnt, over the years." Zuijizra said, running her tongue over her upper lip as she spoke. "Then this pathetic planet somehow stymied our efforts. You have no idea the rage and pain you have caused us, mortal scum, brought down by our masters for our stalemate. It will be repaid onto your world a thousand fold. You will be the first to begin payment of my own debt…"

"Oh, and you had to go and make me feel special." Daldion said, and signaled to Zackel.

Zuijizra had paid far too much attention to her playthings, having almost completely ignored the layout of the streets around her and various details about them.

One of them was a massive clump of logs tied on a rope, apparently left over from the construction of the Deeprun Tram. Said logs were being dangled above the street to Zuijizra's personal right.

Until the giant chunk of ice Daldion had been manifesting since he'd seen them smashed into them.

And Zackel, having seen them himself and made the connection, hurled a blade of ice at the rope.

And missed.

Zuijizra turned as the lengths of wood swung violently from the impact, crashing into her and knocking her sprawling. Despite this, Daldion cursed violently, even as Zackel stared at his failure. His neglecting of his magical practice had finally caught up to him: while Zuijizra had clearly felt the impact from the logs, cutting the rope would have made the logs fly free and smash head-long into her, knocking her across the street and maybe even crashing her into another building. Instead, she'd merely been staggered.

It might have just been a difference in seconds, but in a case like this, seconds were all that mattered, as Zackel and Daldion tried to flee through the main dwarf forge area before Zuijizra could recover. Glaring after them, the man'ari cracked her neck and twisted her sword to face towards the ground.

"Enough of this."

The street beneath Zuijizra seemed to shriek as she plunged her sword into it, and then the ground in front of her erupted in an updraft of burning mist. Zuijizra had unleashed her own version of the steam explosion, as she superheated pockets of water underneath the road and caused them to blast upward with the force of a hurricane. The forge area was rocked by multiple bursts of the encroaching attack, even as the mages desperately tried to outrun it.

They almost did.

The last steam eruption came at their heels, and while Zackel and Daldion avoided being boiled alive, the two were once again thrown from their feet. Unfortunately, this time their loss of their _terra firma_ came with considerably more vertical momentum.

Zackel ended up doing a nearly complete flip before hitting the ground. The impact drove the air from his lungs and briefly paralyzed his body, but even that didn't keep him from hearing the angry cry of pain Daldion emitted as he landed. Gasping for air, and then wheezing on all the smoke that filled Stormwind's streets, Zackel somehow managed to re-summon his strength and start getting up.

"Dald-" Was all Zackel got out before he began violently coughing. The mage wiped his watering eyes and tried to find his brother.

He found him falling back down with another yell. Zackel blinked a few more times to clear his vision and then rushed over.

"Damn it…!" Daldion cursed, clutching at his ankle. Zackel didn't need to see it to know that Daldion had clearly screwed something up with his landing.

"Come on Daldion…!" Zackel said, trying to lift his brother's weight onto himself and drag him along. Two seconds and one collapse later drove home the brutal difference in body and weight differences between the siblings, but Zackel refused to pay attention to that as he tried to pick Daldion back up.

"Zackel…" Daldion whispered. Zackel thought he was being warned about the man'ari's approach and turned his head to look, but there was nothing behind him except a cloud of smoke and steam.

"Come on, we can…"

"Leave me."

"What? Forget it!" Zackel said, before his legs gave out from under him. When he tried to lift his brother up once more, Daldion responded by pushing him away.

"Daldion-!"

"Get out of here! Now!' Daldion said, pushing himself up to a semi-standing position and thrusting his staff at Zackel when he tried to move in and help him again. "You can't carry both of us! I'm going to stay and give that thing something to devote its attention to!"

"I'm not leaving you to-!"

"That choice is gone, brother." Daldion said, and from his tone, Zackel realized Daldion wasn't just talking about how this one-sided battle has transpired.

"Daldion…"

"Run." Daldion said, blue energy manifesting around his eyes. "I don't want it all to be a waste…"

Daldion saw the shadow cross into his line of vision. He saw his brother's eyes go as wide as saucers. And he knew.

"Waste is all that it will all come to…" Came the voice.

Daldion looked at his brother's eyes, and he briefly closed his own before his hand clenched.

"Speak for yourself." Daldion said, and whirled around as the ice began to fly from his hand.

The blade was swifter.

Zackel felt his brother's scream in his soul as much as his ears, as Zuijizra's blade came down on his shoulder and hacked his right arm completely off. Blood erupted into the air, spraying directly into Zackel's face and briefly blinding him, before Daldion staggered backwards and slammed into his brother, knocking them both to the ground. Despite the mastery of flame Zuijizra had demonstrated, Daldion's wound had clearly not been cauterized from the attack, and more blood fountained from the stump and onto Zackel's body and face. Despite all the heat the mage had already been subjected to, the moist, sticking hotness of the blood on him proceeded to nearly overwhelm his mind, as Zackel began clawing at his features, trying to get the liquid off. Daldion made no more noise, having clearly gone into shock, his twitching weight pinning Zackel to the ground. Zackel had lost his staff somewhere in the impact, and Daldion had been holding his in the arm he had lost.

And before him, Zuijizra threw back her head and laughed. The wretched, horrifying sound of it drew Zackel back from the brink, and he briefly tried to stand up and resume trying to pull his brother to safety. Almost immediately, he slipped in the blood and fell down again, prompting another laugh from Zuijizra. Zackel looked at the man'ari, even as she finished her merriment and locked her eyes with him.

In her gaze, Zackel felt the little hope he had left wither and die.

"Trying to crawl away. Like a little worm." Zuijizra said, and stabbed downward at the ground in her immediate vicinity. Zackel, his body beginning to be seized by violent trembling, watched as she lifted up his brother's arm impaled on the end of the sword.

"What right does a worm have to limbs?" Zuijizra said, and Daldion's arm erupting into flames, burning to ash within seconds, Zackel watched it all, unable to look away.

"…run…!" Daldion whispered, but Zackel was beyond hearing him. Zuijizra fully had his attention, even as tears began to leak down his face.

"What, no anger? No desire to revenge yourself? No last-moment futile defiance? Come now, don't be more of a worthless insect than you already are." Zuijizra said, pointing at Zackel with her sword. The motion made Zackel feel like someone had pressed the left side of his face into a fire, and he screamed and recoiled, clutching at his wound. Zuijizra cocked her head, regarding her work, even as Zackel looked back at her with his uncovered eye, the tears having traced a line down his bloodsoaked face.

"…even now. Pathetic." Zuijizra said, pointing with her sword again. "So this is what you are at the core. I should have hacked you apart first. Well, if this is what you are going to present to me, then you will not yield from it. Beg."

Zackel stared in horror, even as he removed his hand from his burned and bloody face.

"BEG ME LITTLE BOY. Beg for mercy, for the slightest advent of my wrath. It's what you _are_, so _DO IT._ Do what you can to stay my hand. _DO WHAT YOU ARE."_

In that moment of hell, with Stormwind burning around him, his brother's blood covering him, his dying brother beside him, and his mind smashed and battered by the whole experience, Zackel looked at the force that would bring him death…

And he listened, as he lowered his head.

"Please…"

Zuijizra's eyes narrowed, even as Zackel fully prostrated himself.

"Please…stop…" Zackel said, as he began to crawl towards the man'ari eredar. Whether Zackel actually thought that this action would have worked, or if he knew he was going to die and hoped this would somehow bring him less pain, even the mage himself could not have said. His mind had gone to a place of broken despair Zackel could have never conceived or grasped until he was there, and it had taken anything resembling a will to fight or honor or pride to keep.

He just wanted it to end.

"Please…" Zackel begged, crawling towards Zuijizra's feet.

The hoof nearly broke Zackel's jaw as Zuijizra lashed out, kicking the mage back towards his brother. Later, Zackel would wish that the blow had knocked him out. But, perhaps because of his cowardice, he was not even granted that small mercy, as he looked up once more at Zuijizra.

"You would _**ACTUALLY BEG?**_" Zuijizra said, the disbelief in her tone giving way to sadistic joy. "You are even more worthless than I thought. Lower than excrement. And you actually think it will somehow grant you any relief. All you've shown is how worthy you are to know TRUE AGONY."

The grin split the man'ari's face again, even as she reached her sword up and licked Daldion's blood off the blade.

"I will burn you in ways you could never comprehend." Zuijizra said, as Zackel stared in horror. "I will bring you suffering beyond any nightmare you could have. And no matter how much you beg…it will never end. You belong to me. Forever."

With that, the man'ari threw back her head and laughed, a laugh that would scar itself into Zackel's mind for the rest of his life, a sound of absolute, pure evil. The laugh echoed across the burning streets, and seemed to go on for an eternity in and of itself before the man'ari finally stopped.

"And forever…" Zuijizra said, raising her hand as green fire began to burn on it. "Is longer than you thi-"

The arrow flew from nowhere, impaling itself right through the man'ari's mocking throat.

It was hard to tell who looked more surprised, Zuijizra or Zackel. Zuijizra, understandably, reacted first, as she reached up to her throat with a wet, bloody gasp, blackish blood erupting from her mouth.

The pain and surprise swiftly vanished from her eyes, and with a snarling scream she actually ripped the arrow right out in a burst of more black blood. Though Zackel couldn't actually see her wound swiftly began to close, he didn't have to. All he needed was the way the man'ari eredar threw the arrow aside, like she'd been stung by a bee rather then had her windpipe and spine impaled.

Somehow, Zackel's fear grew even more. Even struck a mortal wound, the creature would not die.

There was no escape for him. No mercy. No miracle…

But the Light had other viewpoints.

"_**DEMMMMMOOOOOOONNNNNNNN!"**_

Zackel was vaguely away of the form leaping over him, even as Zuijizra lifted her head to see.

The draenei paladin crashed down with a thunderous roar of fury, slamming into the man'ari with a defiant, righteous anger that eclipsed even Zuijizra's own, as the paladin brought his shining gem hammer down and into the man'ari's shrieking face. The two tumbled across the road and crashed into one of the semi-shattered buildings Zuijizra's sword had damaged, causing the structure to completely collapse and send another blast of dust, smoke, and ash across the streets.

For who knows how long, Zackel could only stare, his brain seemingly unable to grasp what had occurred. Only a low groan brought Zackel out of his state, and he frantically realized that his brother was still alive, but not for long.

"Daldion!" Zackel said, crawling over to his badly wounded brother. Daldion coughed, but made no other sound, his face pale. Zackel frantically began looking through his robes, before he realized that, somewhere during the battle, he'd lost his bags. Any healing potions he might have had were gone. Maybe he should have spent a few more seconds securing them to him.

And when he looked back at Daldion, what he saw struck him once again, right at the core.

After that, all Zackel could do was look up and scream for help. His cries echoed across the burning streets, but no one came to answer them. Even the night elf hunter who had struck the initial blow against the man'ari had moved on by now, and while said hunter and the draenei that had engaged Zuijizra in battle were only the very first of the reinforcements coming from Ironforge, the rest would not arrive in time to grant aid.

Once again, Zackel was completely helpless.

And all the screams in the world didn't, and never would, change that.

It never did.

* * *

"…_what I saw…on my brother's face…after we were…rescued…" Zackel said quietly. "It almost killed me. It was…the most naked, vehement look of DISGUST…that I had ever seen. And I deserved it. When he needed me the most…I wasn't there. After all the needling and competition between us, in learning magics, and how I thought I'd come out ahead in the end, and how he'd grown to accept that…it was all wrong. He was stronger than I was, where it counted, by a degree I could never match. I…I couldn't even run away, or even give my life when it mattered. Instead I…abased myself before that creature. It was…all I could think to do. It was…who I was."_

_Zackel fell silent for a long time. Rielle did not speak, but she was no longer looking at the fire. Her gaze had been on Zackel for a while now._

"…_So…no, Rielle. My failure is not judging you on your experiences. I did not judge you at all. I have no right." Zackel said. "My failing was looking at you and seeing the image of that creature…and what I really was."_

"…_you…think I…" Rielle finally spoke._

"_No." Zackel interrupted. "No. It is not you. It is merely the superficial resemblance in your visage. The rest is all me. To look at you, and think, for ANY reason, that you are like that creature…my failing. Only mine. Who I am."_

_Rielle was silent again, glancing at the fire, clearly doing some thinking._

"_There is one last detail." Zackel said, causing the draenei to look at him again. "Your…misunderstanding came from how I acted in Tarren Mills. Why I helped the orc. Why I didn't kill the Forsaken when I had them at my mercy. Your experience has taught you there is little good in the Horde, and it will not last. You thought I condemned you for that viewpoint. I don't. Maybe you are right. And now you know why I looked at you…like I did. Because of my failing." Zackel said. "But my viewpoint of the Horde…is not a failing. Because of what happened to me after I failed. Because they gave me more than I deserved."

* * *

_

"HELP USSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!" Zackel screamed, his throat raw and bleeding, as he looked around at the destruction around him for the eighth or so time.

Eight, it seemed, was enough, as Daldion finally spoke again.

"Zackel…" Daldion said, his voice the barest whisper. "I told you…to run…"

"No…no…!" Zackel said, fresh tears running down his face. "I can't, I can't…!"

Where Daldion got the strength, Zackel didn't know. It was likely his last bit of adrenaline, as the mage reached up, seize Zackel by the front of his scorched robe, and yanked him down to face him.

"_RUN."_ Daldion hissed. _"I WON'T…HAVE MOTHER…LOSE BOTH OF US…YOU SHIT."_

The words struck Zackel as painfully as any of Zuijizra's blows had, even as Daldion's hand went limp and fell away, releasing Zackel from his grip. Daldion looked at his brother, the light in his eyes beginning to dim. Zackel looked back, even as part of his brain finally cut itself off from all the emotion that had ravaged the mage and began trying to get Zackel to rise to his feet.

Before Zackel became aware of the presence, and jerked his head towards it.

The man seemed to have just stumbled across the pair of mages, and was apparently as surprised at Zackel looking at him as the mage was realizing he was there. His robes might have been white once upon a time: the chaos around them had stained them with ash and soot, and stray bits of hair was peeking out from beneath the close-fitting robe/hood the man wore. Zackel blinked in surprise at the sight of the man, and then blinked again as he saw the symbols on his robe.

"…priest." Zackel said, scrambling up and towards the man, who took a step back, clearly uncertain if Zackel was a threat. "Wait no! Please, help! My brother, he's dying! I need healing! Please, help me!"

The man's face ticked towards Daldion's limp form and then back at Zackel. Zackel was too desperate to notice his hesitation, as he staggered over and collapsed at the man's knees.

"Please! I'll do anything! Help him! HELP HIM PLEASE!" Zackel begged, looking up at the man's strangely unaffected face. The man looked down at Zackel, back at Daldion, and then down at Zackel again.

Then he pushed Zackel aside and swiftly walked over to Daldion, kneeling down and feeling at his throat. Zackel crawled over to help, if needed, as the priest pulled away what remained of the robe on Daldion's torso and investigated the jagged end of what had once been his arm, the blood flow having alarmingly slowed down.

"…limb…" The priest said.

"Gone! Just close the wound! Hurry, please!" Zackel said. The priest did not reply, instead holding out his hands over Daldion's bleeding stump. A second later, his hands began to glow.

As Zackel watched, a small river of energy flowed from the priest's hands and into Daldion's form, the hole in his body closing up and sealing shut. Daldion's color went from deathly gray to just gray, and his low, quick breathing slowed down a bit, his body relaxing in the freedom from pain's grip. At the sight of it, Zackel closed his eyes and uttered a small prayer to himself, before opening his eyes again and looking at the priest.

"Thank you." Zackel said. The priest returned his look for a moment, before giving a slight, slow nod in return. "We have to get to safety. The damn passageway to the keep was shattered but…"

A distant explosion caused Zackel to recoil and jerk towards its noise, his veins briefly filling with ice at the thought that the man'ari was returning to finish the job. But Zuijizra did not re-emerge, and after several terror-filled seconds, Zackel turned back to speak to the priest.

All he saw was empty air. The man was gone, leaving Zackel alone. The mage blinked, and then looked down, wondering if life had visited upon him a further cruelty and that he had just imagined it all. But Daldion's wound remained closed, and his chest continued to rise and fall.

Whether it would continue to do so suddenly became brutally apparent, as a felhound abruptly emerged from the ash clouds nearby.

Zackel stared in horror.

Then the air was filled with new explosions, this time the sound of bullets, as the dwarves charged from the smoke behind Zackel and blew the felhound apart before it could even get close to the two mages. Zackel's relief was somewhat ruined by the near heart-stopping shock of the dwarves' entrance, but he got over it.

"Aye men, one of ours!" One dwarf said, quickly making his way over to Zackel. "What's the situation lad?"

"Huh, what…demons, invading, brother hurt, we, I…"

"Calm down lad. Help's right behind us. Don't you worry, Ironforge will aid you in driving these monsters out!" The dwarf said, and moved on, clearly in the grip of a battle lust and not planning or wanting to stick around to deal with situations out of his expertise.

"But…did you…" Zackel said, as more dwarves and adventurers emerged from the ash and smoke, the bulk of the reinforcements having finally arrived on the Deeprun Tram behind the initial small numbers that had arrived first. Daldion was quickly taken into medical care by the 'trauma healers' who had come with the group, even as those skilled in the arts of fighting brought said skills to bear on the Legion's troops.

In the end, Kruul was driven from Stormwind, and the Legion was ground beneath the Alliance's boot.

And whatever may or may not have happened to the creature known as Zuijizra The Blaze, Zackel never learned.

* * *

_Now._

"I didn't notice it at the time, for…obvious reasons." Zackel said. "It was only later, when I was pondering the details, that I recalled something I'd seen. The priest who saved Daldion's life…his eyes didn't match. One looked normal, but the other…was blank. Blank and dimly glowing. Part of a lost piece of a disguise, I suspect. It was a Forsaken."

Rielle said nothing about this revelation; perhaps she'd even worked it out herself. She just continued to regard Zackel with a neutral, blank look.

"…I don't know why the Forsaken was there. Maybe he was part of a spy operation and was trying to flee. Maybe he was trying to look in on people he'd known when he was alive and got caught up in the Legion attack. Maybe he was committing an assassination, I don't know." Zackel said. "All I know is he saved my brother's life. He didn't have to. He could have ignored us and fled, or, if he was concerned about leaving witnesses, he could have easily killed us both. Instead, he helped us. He put aside our differences in sides, and whatever anger and grief he may have held towards the living for his existence…and he helped us. For whatever his reasons were…he helped us. I have never forgotten that. And I never will. You're right, there's a lot of evil among the Horde. But as Adaric showed, that is true of the Alliance as well. And on the Horde's side…there are those who have good hearts, despite it all. Much like your species, despite all the pain and suffering they've experienced, have stayed true to the course of the Light. So I helped that orc female, and I spared those Forsaken who wished to torture and kill me. Because I had already failed everything I knew and stood for that day. After that, I had to live with what I knew then, and had to once again decide what I stood for. And when I did, I vowed that I would never fail so badly again."

Silence settled on the room again. Zackel picked up a canteen and turned his gaze to it, focusing water into existence within it.

"My brother dreamed of seeing the world. Of helping people. To repay the fact it had rewarded him and I with power, and that the pain and tragedy we had suffered was not as bad as some had. As I've mentioned in passing, we began training to be mages after gnolls attacked our village. They hurt my father, took my mother, and it was only due to the Light's blessing of fortune that both did not die from it. We were going to be strong, to repay our blessing upon other people…and perhaps make some money and enjoy the fruits of life along the way. And when we were done, we'd return to our village and make sure it was safe. And, if needed, more." Zackel said. "Then I went and turned into a selfish, idiotic piece of shit because Jasciona changed. I became obsessed with the concept that there might be something inherently bad about my powers, and that it could affect my goals…but in truth, Daldion's accusation was right. I was lying to myself. I just wanted an excuse to wallow in my pain and suffering. And because my brother loved me…he didn't press until it was too late. We shouldn't have been in Stormwind that day. Even if we HAD been, I should have had my head on straight. I shouldn't have become so mentally soft that when Adaric went and called Zuijizra that…I failed. In everything. Only more of the Light's blessing kept me from losing my brother. And even despite that…it was not without cost."  
Zackel drank from the canteen before he lowered it, still in his hands.

"Magic is not easy to learn. To properly make it flow within you, magicians must learn a specific form of control and focus…and the second most vital part of it, after the mind, is the hands. The key word there being _hands_. With the loss of his arm, Daldion…lost himself. He could remember all the teachings and experience he had with the arcane…but his body could no longer focus it properly. He might as well have lost all his magic entirely." Zackel said. "And while it's far from impossible for him to regain what he had…there's a reason you don't see many one armed adventurers. Daldion will have to completely retrain himself, literally breaking everything he knew down and then building it back up. Our initial training took several months, but something like that…could take years. The Maginor did his part, took Daldion in to support him and help him in those efforts. And Daldion's grateful that he's alive. But…there likely won't be any more adventuring for him. Even if he learns to re-use magic, he likely won't be able to grow past the heights you need to scale to be a true force, and be on the front lines of the conflicts in Azeroth. At best, he can learn enough to be a permanent defense in our home. Anything else…went up with his arm."

Zackel dropped the canteen, looking at the ground.

"It should have been me. It was…what I deserved."

Rielle did not respond. Zackel let the ever-cycling silence stay for another few beats before he began to finish his long story.

"I still believe that I should approach my teachings at my own pace. But that's only because of Daldion, and what he lost. The fact that half the time he can barely look me in the eye was far, far more than I needed to get back onto the road and resume my training in the arts. I've put Jasciona behind me, and with what I've learned from it, I'll approach power my way…but for Daldion, I _WILL_ become the very best that I can be. My road may be long and winding, but I _will_ reach my destination. And that is that." Zackel said. "That's why I had those odd zoning out moments. That's why I helped the Horde. That's the face of my nightmares. You're the first one I've ever told since that day. After the anger and pain I caused you…I felt you deserved to know. If it just makes you hate me all the more, well…I probably deserve it. I probably deserve worse."

Zackel turned, looking towards the fireplace. It had just about burned down to embers, and Zackel could feel the exhaustion from lack of sleep and the emotional wringer he had just gone through recounting his greatest shame and the driving force in his life settling down on him.

And looking at the fire…he remembered one last thing.

"I suppose you have a valid reason to dislike ice and cold." Zackel said. Rielle blinked, clearly not sure exactly what this conversational shift meant. "Ice and cold has trapped us here. It's robbed you of your chance to seek your rightful revenge on Sparse. It will potentially kill us both if we tried to traverse it. It sucks the life from things, reducing them to empty husks of their former self…even as in Northrend, it almost protects and reinforces the undead. Maybe my travels have left me ignorant, as I have been in other things in my life…but…all the same…"

Zackel reached over, picking up a log and dropping it on the fading fire.

"…I've found…since then…sometimes, when I think about it…" Zackel said, looking as the flames began to grow anew, consuming the fresh log. "That I don't really…care for fire. Yes, it provides light…and heat, and without those two life would be so much harder. But…fire answers to no one, in the end. It can seem otherwise, coming at the beck and call to any fool who doesn't understand what they're doing, and at the same time, to something as terrible as Zuijizra was…and yet, in the end, it only obeys until it does not. In the end…fire seems like something that can barely be leashed, and never be tamed."

A knot in the wood snapped. Zackel surprised himself by not flinching, instead raising a hand and dully regarding it.

"Since then…I've done my best to avoid calling on it. But ice…ice is different. Ice takes time to understand, to grasp. It speaks not in roaring rage but in ever-approaching stride. Fire can come to anyone, but ice…ice only comes to those who are willing to speak to it. It might be the weapon of lichs and cryptspawn…but only because they wield it through the prism of death, the reality that is all they now know. Just an aspect…not the truth. The truth, to me…"

Misty blue energy flowed up from Zackel's palm. Rielle stiffened, her hand clearly beginning to draw her dagger, but Zackel barely seemed to notice.

Above his hand, a flower of frozen water had appeared, opening up into a small, upwards bloom.

"To me, ice is just…what I understand. Then and now. Moreso now. Fire, for all its benefits…in the end, I suspect it would just regard me as more fuel. With ice, I am, at least…an appreciated servant."

The flower melted away, the water flowing down and vanishing from Zackel's palm.

"And that's…all I have to say."

Zackel turned away from Rielle, crawling back over to his bedding. He did not check to see if she followed him with her gaze or not. He really didn't care.

Well…that was not entirely true.

It was hard to tell, under his weary state, but telling the story of the day the Legion had tried to raze Stormwind had done more than open an old wound in Zackel's heart. Despite the pain of revisiting it all…Zackel felt somehow lighter. Like the process of finally telling someone about that day had lifted a burden off him, even if it was just the burden of being alone in his judgment.

The truth, it seemed, did set you free.

And however Rielle handled it…was a question for another day.

For in the day to come, another question would soon be answered.

* * *

"_All your dreams are just illusion_

_Based on nothing and confusion_

_Don't you look behind the curtain_

_No more time, the end is certain."_

* * *

_In Stormwind Keep._

"Fool!" The gnome muttered, pacing among the wounded, Zackel vaguely watching the small creature as he knelt by Daldion's bed. "No warlock should attempt a summon without fully understanding his craft and surroundings! Such an event would never happen to myself!"

"Shut up Fizzlebang."


	20. Parts Of A Hole

Chapter 20: Parts of a Hole

Cold, it seemed, was the great tester of men.

In a world very different from Azeroth, it had been the cold of terrible winters and the long, fierce grip of ice ages that mankind had endured to spread across the world on bridges of ice that vanished behind them, in time. As civilization rolled on, others had endured the cold of the world to discover lands anew, seek routes of trade, and set themselves on the peaks and the very roof of the world. Cold brought little, and took much, but for those who could survive, there was no greater craftsmanship of exceptional men.

Even in Azeroth, a land of magical power and incredible abilities, anyone who was wise gave respect to the cold.

Zackel, in his own small way, worshipped it. At least, that would be the reason he would give for why he was out on the Alterac fortress roof, standing amongst the howling gale and the white near-oblivion that engulfed him. It was the best word he could think of to describe it, though it was not a worship that would mirror the more traditional kinds, with tenants and deities and sacrifice. It was, in the end, the manifestation of the deep, respectful symbiosis that he had worked so hard to craft with the nature of the cold. He was not alone: virtually all frost mages (and some Death Knights) held a similar mindset.

The difference between them and Zackel was that, had they started this blizzard, they might have been able to stop it. If they could not, they would have retreated and waited for the spell to burn itself out. If they had tried, and failed, to stop it, likely all of them would have said that the latter option was the only option.

Zackel was out amongst the storm he had summoned because from his respect of the cold, he knew he could handle it, and possibly tame it. But the reason he was even trying, and refusing to yield, was another entirely.

He had not been woken up by Rielle, and when he had woken up on his own, she had not been in the room. Zackel had eaten and gotten dressed, and upon her lack of return, had gone to do what she'd told him to do in such bitter acrimony last night.

More than a few would have said he was a fool for doing so, and in truth, Zackel knew he was edging around the gates of reason. But the circumstances of last night, and of the whole 'gilded cage' experience he'd had, and was still having, with the draenei, was just complicated and uncertain enough that he hadn't waited in the room for her to return, or gone to look for her to see whether she'd changed her mind or not. He knew that the rage she'd directed towards him was undeserved, but he also knew Rielle was smart enough to know that, and he did _not_ know if she herself could tell that or not, or not _yet_. To really know, he had to arrange circumstances which did not suit such anger, and waiting for her in the room or trying to find her had too many random variables to his liking. So he'd gone up to the roof and begun his latest effort to stop the storm, and waited to see what would happen from there.

Those few might also say he was giving far too much for his choices. Zackel would not be able to say they were wrong.

But he would also be able to say that the sleep he'd had had been more restful than anything he'd had in weeks, if not months. That, and the fact that when he'd walked out into the storm, the cold of the wind had seemed like a firm clutch rather than a biting knife.

It was the latter that had really spoken to the mage, and indicated to Zackel that, as wrong as her reasons had been, Rielle had given something to him. She'd forced circumstances so that he'd had no choice to reveal his darkest shame. Had she not been so irrational over his choices in Tarren Mills, odds were that he would still have kept the events of that day locked within himself. A weight on his soul.

How a frost mage interpreted cold could heavily depend on mindset. Ever since that day, despite his greater ability to endure it, Zackel had always felt intense cold as blades on his skin.

Not any more.

The weight was not gone, but so many of the chains had seemed to have been cast off in the sleep that he'd had last night. Rielle, as poorly as she had acted, had a hand in it.

So he'd done as she'd asked. If she did not come, than he would go from there. Once that was decided, he'd simply slipped into a mental focus state, and opened his mind to the power that he'd unleashed. As he did, the magic surged through his body, Zackel using its power and his respect of the cold to adapt his biological functions to endure it. Once that was done, he began the dialogue.

Time fell away. All concerns of the events within the castle, with Rielle and otherwise, ceased to be part of Zackel's mind. He embraced the winter, and the winter embraced him in turn. And they spoke.

Zackel was aware of the slowly encroaching danger. There was no degree of 'worship' that would protect him indefinitely from the hostile nature of the storm he'd called. Eventually, he WOULD freeze to death. But Zackel believed there was enough respect there that he would be allowed to turn and leave when the strain began to reach the true danger zone.

Before it did, the faint voice began calling to him.

Zackel managed to return his senses back to reality in time for the rod to jab him in the back. Zackel moved a bit to adjust himself, even as the symbiotic state slipped away from him, knowing that their conversation was at an end.

"ZACKEL!" Rielle was screaming over the howl of the wind. Zackel's mind took somewhat longer to respond than it normally would, slowed by the cold, but it had not lowered so much that he could tell it wasn't a yell to alert him of an incumbent danger. Rielle wanted his attention, for whatever reason.

Zackel's motions were also slowed, as he turned towards the Draenei, whose features briefly looked pissed off before she briefly crossed her arms, a universal sign of how unpleasant she found the rooftop to be.

"What the fel are you DOING?" Rielle asked.

"…you wanted…the storm…ended, Rielle." Zackel said. Had he been a normal person, Rielle never would have heard him speak: she could barely hear herself. But he was a frost mage, and had just spent a long time in conversation with his power. While it did not respect him enough to cease, it respected him enough to carry his words to the draenei instead of away into itself. "So I have…tried to do so."

"How long have you been up here?"

"Oh, give or take, carry the one…about five hours."

"FIVE HOURS?" Rielle yelled, looking at Zackel like he was completely insane.

" Likely…good practice…for enduring the conditions in Northrend…" Zackel said. "Which I think I will be…experiencing sometime in my relatively near future…barring unforeseen and…unfortunate circumstances."

"_YOU WEERKUAY IDIOT!_ GET YOUR DUMB, STUPID ASS INSIDE BEFORE I THROW YOU DOWN THE STAIRS!" Rielle yelled. "I THOUGHT YOU WERE SMARTER THAN THIS! WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO PROVE, MAGE!"

"…only what…I can." Zackel said, as he began to slowly walk forward. Rielle snorted, a sheen of mist erupting from her nose as she turned and half-stalked, half-fled back to the open door and the slightly greater warmth that lay there. Zackel followed at a considerably slower pace, and not because he wanted to show off his greater ability to endure the wind and cold. Despite what he said, he'd somewhat overdone it in his dialogue with the storm, and his body was feeling it. He would have to be careful with what he did next.

Rielle, having headed down the stairs, had started going back up them when he appeared in the door frame, and she crossed her arms and glared with angry impatience as he began to make his way down them.

"So lemme guess. All you managed to do up there was unsuccessfully attempt suicide."

"If by that you mean…continue to be unable to stop the storm…then yes."  
"Figures. You can't do _anything_ right." Rielle said. Zackel did not reply. "HURRY YOUR STUPID ASS UP!"

"I…can't."

"Oh really. Why, you think it will keep you from getting your ass kicked? Because believe me…"

"I…must show caution Rielle…or I will die." Zackel said. Rielle put on a doubting look, though Zackel could tell it was at least partially a front.

"Please. If you're not dead already from being out there so long, you probably won't die now." Rielle said, stalking up the stairs. "Fel, how are you not a statue alre-"

Rielle's words died off as she reached out and touched Zackel's face, mainly to assess any damage he might have in order to know how hard she could smack him.

The cold she felt beneath her fingers made that intent die off within a second, and she had to fight to recoil. There was still a trace of heat within Zackel's skin, but Rielle only knew that due to her continual warrior training and her own sensitive sense of touch allowing her to pick it up. Even so, what the draenei found was that Zackel's skin was so cold to the touch that Rielle, had she not had visual clarification, would have sworn she was feeling a corpse. No longer being distracted by the storm, Rielle could now see that all of Zackel's hair was encrusted with ice, which was just beginning to melt. He hadn't been lying. He HAD been out there for hours.

"…Zackel…what did you DO to yourself…?" Rielle said.

"I tried to stop the storm. It requires certain…efforts."

"You _idiot,_ get your dumb ass in front of the fire before you break a part off yourself…"

"No. Not yet…" Zackel whispered. "My heart rate…is at dangerous levels to provide enough heat to keep me alive. I need to…sit down at the bottom of the stairs…and re-adjust my biorhythms. Or I could…go into cardiac arrest. Hence, die. So…if you're just going to insult me…please move so I can at least…not collapse on you while I do so."

"…you IDIOT." Rielle snapped, but she did not move aside. Instead, she moved to Zackel's side and placed an arm around him, aiding him down the stairs. Zackel felt her shudder as she touched him and how unnaturally cold his body and clothes were, but she kept in contact as they made their way to the bottom of the stairs. Once they were there, Zackel sank down to the floor, assuming a meditative position.

While his primary focus was on the issues that he had just brought up, there was still a small part of Zackel's mind that was paying attention to what Rielle did next.

What she did was kneel down next to him, her eyes flicking back and forth over his body.

"…can you summon a fire or something?"

"…not like this…not yet…" Zackel whispered.

"…is there anything I can do?"

"…there is the obvious…but I'll understand if…you don't want to do that. Besides that…there's not really…" Zackel said.

Despite himself, he was mildly surprised when Rielle put her arms around him. Then he felt her intense shudder at his low body temperature, and realized he had best concentrate his own efforts, lest he do harm to the alien.

"H-Hurry your ass up." Rielle said, her teeth chattering a bit as Zackel's ice-cold form began reacting to her own body heat: fortunately, Rielle had not worn any of her heavy metal armor when she'd gone onto the roof. "Or I'll just…go grab a log off the fire and stick it down your throat."

"You…don't have to…"

"Yes, _I DO._ I have to do everything around here, because despite being so smart, YOU'RE MORE SO STUPID, and I swear if you try and comment on my grammar there I will bite your ear off."

"…duly…noted." Zackel said, as he began to feel normal sensation return to his body. Rielle kept her embrace, clearly trying to keep her teeth from chattering.

"…I was…not able to stop the storm."

"Yeah." Rielle said.

"…I know that you…"

"Yeah that was the last night you idiot, and I swear if you tried one of those 'I'll hurt myself to make her feel bad!' deals, I'll rip off your testicles and feed them to you. Assuming I can even find them."

"…was that a comment on the cold or my failings as a man?"

"BOTH." Rielle said, shifting a bit and falling silent. Zackel also went quiet, pondering his next move.

"…I'm sorry."

"Oh stop being sorry. Everything about you is sorry. Your ability to think, your ability to fight, your ability to…handle trauma…compared to…some…" Rielle said, seemingly torn between getting angry and making sense. "But what should I expect from someone like you? You've been demonstrating you're a moron since the moment we met."

"…that's what I like about you Rielle. You never stop speaking your mind."

"Shut up asshole." Rielle said, her tone starting to cross the rage threshold again.

"No, no, I meant it. There's no deception in you. You're up front and forward with everything about you…including what you don't like. You wear your heart on your sleeve. Not many people have the courage to do that."

"Flattery will still get you nowhere, Zackel. I haven't suffered amnesia." Rielle said. "In fact, sitting here freezing my well-toned ass off is reminding me why I was so pissed at you to begin with."

"…I'm sorry I can't make you feel different." Zackel said. "If you want…I can go back into the storm…"

"You know I should call you on your lackadaisical attempt at reverse psychology and toss you back out there, and then use your frozen corpse to prop the door closed." Rielle semi-snapped. "I also don't appreciate this passive, doormat-esque mindset. I still say you're a _weerkuay_ moron, but at least you have your reasons for being a moron. Or I'd have let you sit here all alone."

"…so…what about us?"

"Oh you're gonna get _us _out of _this, _Zackel. But…" Rielle said, her tone skirting away from anger and towards thought. "I have thought about it. Where you and I see differently, and why. I haven't…forgiven you, but I don't think forgiven is the right word."

"…at least there's that." Zackel said.

"What, you expected something else, mage? What kind of a person do you think I am?" Rielle said. Zackel winced and closed his eyes, thinking his answer over a second.

"That's a loaded question Rielle. You should be careful with those. As should I."

"Oh, and what does THAT mean, Zackel?"

"Last night, I was completely honest with you. If you want, I can continue." Zackel said, turning to look into Rielle's face. Darts of anger were again crossing her eyes as she narrowed her brow, though she did not release her clinch.

"Tread _very_ carefully, mage. You may think you can change things, but change…is not always good."

"…No…no, I suppose not." Zackel said. "But I will venture and hope what is gained is good. What are you, Rielle?"

Zackel ran his tongue over his teeth for a second, gathering his thoughts.

"You're an exceptionally determined woman. Not just that. You understand and balance your determination. You want to get out of here and know that you, for the most part, can't. A lot of people would go completely stir crazy instead of just mildly, or delude themselves into thinking they should chance what they might not survive. You instead adapt the situation to suit your direction. Which brings up my next point." Zackel said. "You're not just talented. You're enlightened in your talent. I've seen how well you can read body language, how quickly you can adjust to sudden, unexpected changes and variances in combat. The average person would rely entirely on the advantage that would give them over the…well, average person. You don't. You're constantly seeking to better yourself, learn or create new facets of your abilities and skills, and you don't neglect what you were originally taught in the process. You know you're good, but you want to be better. You understand something a lot of people don't: there's no real destination in our journey. Just the journey itself."

"If you think buttering me up is going to lessen what happens when you drop the other shoe, think again, mage."

"No attempt at deflection planned, Rielle. I believe what's good in you outweighs what's bad. What's bad…" Zackel said, steeling himself. "You have anger in you. I can't presume to judge where it comes from or how justified it is. You unleashed it on me, when all I did was what I thought was right. I don't think it was deserved, then and now, and maybe that's what will define us in the end, but…" Zackel said. "You can think. It's not just in your skills and drive. When we debated earlier, you didn't just throw out your opinion and try to bludgeon me with it as a weapon. You looked at it, and while you kept it, you didn't just blithely accept it as unassailable because it was yours. I'd like to think that factor holds true now, and that the immediacy of your anger isn't getting in the way of it. We all have the rage in us in some way. Sometimes it decides more for us then we'd like. But it won't make me change my mind and my opinion, Rielle. If the me of now went back and replaced the me of then, and provided everything played out the same way otherwise…I wouldn't do a thing different."

Rielle's glare briefly intensified, and Zackel felt a small flutter of fear in his gut. Not of the draenei herself, but what was at stake. Some things, as an old poem went, could not be put back together, and finding that out was a terrible thing.

"Why can't you understand the world, Zackel?" Rielle asked.

"The world is a big place. I don't think I've experienced enough to understand it. All I have is…all I have." Zackel said. Rielle said nothing, keeping her gaze locked with Zackel's. "But I can't see how we're different there, Rielle. You've shown me that fact. You ask how I see you? In a way, I see…most of the best aspects of myself. And parts I wish I could have."

"And the rest?"

"…I can't assess those, Rielle. I don't know the story there." Zackel said. "If you want me to do it anyway, then…it's nothing that you can't overcome. Or decide is correct. That choice, in the end, is yours."

"…oh you think you're so clever, don't you." Rielle said. "Think you can manipulate me, like I'm one of your Thrust games. Oh you can't, Zacky-boy. You're not _that _good."

Zackel stared.

"…But…" Rielle began.

The slightest hint of motion registered in Zackel's mind before Rielle broke her embrace around him and whirled towards it, snatching up her axe. Zackel followed her gaze…

He didn't know just what he saw disappearing from his view, it moved too quickly. But he knew he'd seen _something._

"Zackel, tell me that wasn't just my mind having to recover from being frozen by your idiocy." Rielle said.

"…no. I saw it too." Zackel said. He braced himself and then lifted his body back into a vertical position, all his muscles yelling in complaint as he did so. He'd gotten too wrapped up in talking to Rielle to notice his body's slow return to relative normalcy, but the fact that he now needed to move made him realize he could, though his battered form was not happy to have been called on to act. It seemed it would have preferred being motionless and having access to an outside heat source for a few more minutes or hours. Zackel managed, in the end, to get it to shut up, but it was clear his body wasn't to stay quiet long.

"Something's in here." Rielle said, glancing at Zackel before taking off. Zackel followed, a bit slower than he would have liked, and entered the pair's sleeping quarters to find Rielle stalking around, looking said room over.

"Anything?" Zackel said.

"Nothing. Shit. I KNOW I saw something!" Rielle said, semi-dashing over to her armor as she began putting pieces of it on.

"You _did _see something." Zackel said, stealing over to the fire to warm up some more and conduct his own visual sweep. If something had eluded the draenei, though, it eluded him in turn. "The question is, what?"

"What could POSSIBLY be in here, we've been stuck in here for weeks, what could POSSIBLE hide for WEEKS…?" Rielle snapped, slipping her hooved feet into her armored boots.

"Therein lies the question…" Zackel said, gathering his power. "And I think it's a question long overdue for an answer."

"Whatever it is, it better hope it's a ghost. Otherwise, it will find _this _world is a world of hurt." Rielle said, having finished suiting up as she saw fit. Axe in hand, she began heading for the other door.

"I'll be right behind you. Just going to seal off where we've come from." Zackel said, heading to the door they'd entered the room from. A quick check of the hallway revealed nothing new, and Zackel hedged his bets by not just closing and locking the door, but icing it shut. He found Rielle waiting for him on the stairs.

"Let's go Zack. Try and keep up. If you don't, I'm leaving you behind." Rielle said.

"Lead the way." Zackel replied, staff in hand as the two headed down the stairs.

* * *

In a way, Zackel didn't know what would have been worse. Finding obvious evidence that something had changed, or what they had gotten…which was the same old exact abandoned castle they were stuck in. To Rielle, the latter clearly jarred and aggravated her more, as she'd broken into a low, constant mutter after one sweep turned up nothing new. After asking Zackel if his ice traps were still working (Zackel confirmed they were), Rielle had begun stalking around the castle again, a low stream of muffled vitriol spilling from her mouth.

Zackel, on the other hand, kept quiet, for several reasons. One, he didn't want to bother Rielle any more, despite the fact he was getting rather mentally abraded himself by this whole process. But the other was the bigger reason: upon discovering nothing new, and in reflection of the fact that Zackel KNEW he had seen something, the mage had begun turning the issue and experience over in his head once more.

The difference this time, of course, was that Rielle was no longer causing him to forcibly recall the events of that day in Stormwind. With that and its unfortunate side effects lifted off Zackel's shoulders, Zackel found himself no longer distracted by the notion that he was losing his mind, or that aspects of his past were being reflected in his present and would define his present actions. As it turned out, those two factors had been considerable stumbling blocks in the use of his mental abilities, be they ever so humble. So while Rielle stalked and cursed, Zackel followed behind her, watching her back and thinking on the issue.

Like the two were linked, Rielle stopped dead even as a concept gelled inside Zackel's mind.

"Son of a…SHIT! I hate being played with like this!" Rielle cursed, her head jerking back and forth, trying to take it both sides of the hallway at once. Zackel considered trying to put a hand on her shoulder, and decided against it: he probably risked losing his hand if he did so.

"You're not alone there…" Zackel said.

"_Weerkuah _wants to play with me, I'll show him some real fun games…" Rielle said, before her eyes noticed something and settled on Zackel's face. "You. Mage."

"Yes?"

"That look on your face. You have an idea. You damn well _better_ have an idea, or I'll take my frustration out on you!"

"Don't take me in any fashion yet, Rielle…I do have something…something…" Zackel said, trying to interject some of their old banter in his words. He wasn't sure if it worked, and decided to move on instead of pressing. "The way you put it. Play."

"Yeah. Play, except I'm not having any fun." Rielle spat.

"Rielle please, calm down…"

"I AM CALM!" Rielle semi-yelled. The realization of the contradiction sank onto her face two seconds after she'd spoken, leading her to grimace and touch her head. "All right. You had an idea. What's this about playing?"

"That's the thing. I…don't think that's what this is. I've said it before: this is too drawn out to be playing or games." Zackel said, looking around. "If we theorize, again, the concept of a sadistic intelligence watching us…it's too long overdue to make a move. A mind like that can only play for so long before it gets bored. If it was trying to get us into an optimal situation for it to act, well…it had two. Within the last twenty-four hours. And nothing happened."

"Really then. How can I tell something didn't happen to you when I was out of sight, by that logic?" Rielle said.

"…cut my head off."

Rielle arched an eyebrow.

"If you think I'm not me, then remove the chance. Kill me." Zackel said.

"Oh ha ha Zackel, you know you need to…"

Rielle moved so fast that Zackel barely made out the motion. She stopped her abrupt swing an inch from Zackel's neck. Zackel's eyes widened, and he recoiled away from the weapon, staring with wide, shocked eyes. Despite his efforts, he still had trouble following her. Then again, he hadn't exactly had his defenses up.

"…all right. I haven't met someone who could so convincingly fake being pathetic." Rielle said, lowering her weapon. Zackel considered taking umbrage, but decided the alien hadn't really meant it. Maybe. "Continue."

"Okay…we both saw something. Odd things have occurred. Yet at the same time…nothing has happened." Zackel said. "All the evidence, especially considering the last twenty-four hours, flies in the face of something plotting to do us harm. Something cannot be so smart to try and manipulate us as it seemingly is, and so stupid that it hasn't recognized the best time to strike. So, if we eliminate that…"

"BEHIND YOU!' Rielle abruptly yelled, grabbing Zackel and shoving him aside. Zackel hit the wall with some surprise, trying to re-collect his thoughts and whirl around to face what had caused Rielle's alarm…

Only to find nothing. AGAIN. Rielle apparently thought otherwise, though, as she was sprinting down the hallway.

"What's going on!"

"I SAW SOMETHING! I KNOW I DID! YOUR BODY WAS BLOCKING IT!" Rielle yelled over her shoulder, as she whirled around the corner. Zackel ran to follow the alien, who moved amazingly fast considering her heavy armor. After another minute, though, it was clear even her anger couldn't out-pace her need to rest, and Zackel found her at another corner of the lower hallways, breathing hard and deep.

"What is GOING ON…" Rielle hissed through clenched teeth, turning back to the mage. "Did you see anything?"

"Just you. Running around."

"It ducked out of sight literally the second I needed to move you. By the time-ARGH!" Rielle cursed, slashing the wall with her axe.

"…do you want me to finish?"

"What? Oh…yeah. All right Zackel. What's our problem?"

"Well, if it's not something in here that wants to do us harm, and we accept something else is in here…then that just leaves one option. Something is hiding in here with us."

"Hiding?" Rielle said. "For WEEKS?"

"The only other option is we're both going stir-crazy. And I doubt that would manifest for both of us in _the exact same way_." Zackel said. "Something hiding in here with us makes the most sense. It hasn't tried to attack us because it can't handle us. Considering we haven't seen ANYTHING beyond fleeting glimpses of a maybe-something…it must be very, very good at hiding. So good it's somehow managed to do it this whole time. Between that, and the stress of our confinement and…other issues…we overestimated the threat to us. It might not…be a threat at all."

"…a nice theory Zackel." Rielle said. "But it begs the question: WHY DIDN'T IT SET OFF ANY OF YOUR ICE TRAPS?"

"…maybe it secretly viewed me…"

"ALL of them? Didn't you stick a few in random locations just in case?"

"…yes."

"And if something's hiding in here with us…what's it eating? Where's the evidence of its presence? Have you seen anything out of place that could indicate something like that? I haven't, and I should know: I've run around this fortress so many times that I've practically memorized it."

"…no. No I haven't…"

"Don't seize on a theory just because it sounds good to YOU, mage. I'm not putting my life at risk because of your stupidity."

"Rielle, please…"

"No please about it Zack! We have a problem and you are not presenting a solution! And I really don't want you becoming part of the problem again!"

"…I just…"

"What, Zackel? You just what? You don't trust me?"

"…that's…" Zackel trailed off. He did not know what to say. Rielle had raised several significant holes in his theory, and almost any other time, Zackel would have adapted or abandoned it. But…

It wasn't just the fact that without this theory, he didn't have a clue what was going on. It was something else, something he found he just couldn't put into words for Rielle.

He'd been up there, all that time, talking with the cold. The cold that reigned supreme here. He had not been able to talk it down…but in the strange ways of magic, he would have insisted that it respected him.

Yet it had given him no indication of a threat, of some sort of looming danger that put his life at risk. Zackel was certain, CERTAIN, that if that was the case, it would have given him SOMETHING, even something so vague and incomprehensible that it would only make sense in hindsight. Yet, all his 'dialogue' had been in his attempt to stop the storm: he'd been given nothing that could be attributed as a warning, portent, omen, or otherwise.

How could he possibly explain to Rielle that he thought he was correct because the equivalent of a little birdie had not given him reason to think otherwise?

"I…I just think it's the solution that makes the most sense, even if it isn't much. The rest make none."

"Right. Of course. The Light forfend that a mage ever considers that he's completely wrong." Rielle said, her tone alternately snarky and disappointed, though Zackel couldn't place the exact nature of said disappointment. "Bravo, Zack. You are the very height of brilliant."

Zackel's eyes widened, and a puzzle piece snapped into place.

"…of course."

"What? Of course what?"

"If we're not being literally haunted, then my ice traps would have caught something…except…" Zackel said, lifting a finger as he began drawing on the air. "Of COURSE."

"What?"

"The unusual nature of this situation kept me from realizing it. Too many distractions, most of them my own fault." Zackel said. "My ice traps…they're set off by invisible trigger 'lines'. There's several of them, criss-crossing back and forth in the trap's setup…but they're all at least two feet off the ground."

Rielle stared, and Zackel saw the wheels turning in her own brain.

"We thought that something that might be here didn't have the substance to set off traps, but…" Zackel began.

"What if something was so small or cautious to go UNDER them all the time?" Rielle said. "That COULD happen but…what would be that small? A gnome? A kobold?"

"I don't know. All I know is it's time for some adjustments…" Zackel said, planting his staff with both hands. Rielle felt the temperature drop in the immediate vicinity, and took a few steps back to get out of Zackel's cold field.

"You're adjusting the trigger lines?"

"Carefully…or WE'LL set them off when we go through them. They're somewhat pre-designed spells, and they don't react well to tampering…" Zackel said, closing his eyes. He felt Rielle and the hallway drift away, his senses reaching out to the nearest of his traps. He grit his teeth as he mentally adjusted the trigger lines and then re-solidified the trap's status. With that done, his mind moved to the next one, carefully making the same adjustments. Then the next…

If Zackel had had eyes on the back of his head, he might have noticed the contemplative look that had come over Rielle's face as she watched him. But what she was thinking, and how it related to him, was literally miles away from Zackel's thought process. If he could adjust all the traps, then maybe answers would come. Or, at the least, he could know for sure his thought process was completely wrong…

_ARE YOU SO CERTAIN THAT THAT SOLUTION FAVORS YOU?_

Zackel's eyes snapped open, and he recoiled backwards, startling Rielle from the suddenness of the motion.

"What…!" Rielle began.

And on the heels of her voice, the faint, crackling crunch noise came, even as Zackel felt fingers of ice run up his arm.

And behind that…came the soft, short cry.

Zackel jerked his head towards the direction it had come from, and then back towards Rielle, whose own surprise was vanishing from her face.

"I KNOW I heard something!" Rielle said, and took off. Zackel stared after the warrior, the wheels turning slower than he would have liked…

As he realized the thought that his surprise had driven away.

"RIELLE WAIT I DIDN'T TURN OFF ALL…!"

Whether Zackel's warning helped her, or it was simply her own reflexes, Rielle managed to stop on a dime and leap backwards as the hallway walls in front of her abruptly bloomed into a dozen stabbing ice lances, the frost weapons crashing together where Rielle would have been if she'd kept going.

"…You IDIOT!" Rielle snapped, glaring at Zackel.

"Sorry I…"

"DON'T CARE!" Rielle yelled, turning and smashing through the ice with two great sweeps of her axe. Zackel felt a brief flush of shame at having nearly hurt the draenei, before the realization slammed down onto his thoughts anew. Another trap had been set off. They'd heard a cry.

Something WAS here.

When Zackel caught up to Rielle, she was smashing her way through the originally triggered trap. Zackel stopped to observe, and his heart seized up. There was nothing, as far as he could tell, on the other side of the triggered defense. A quick scan of the area around him gave no evidence that anything was THERE, either. It was another false lead, another dead end…

Before Rielle started through the second trap she'd shattered…and then immediately stopped, having seen something on the ground. She dropped to one knee, as Zackel quickly made his way to her side.

Rielle was looking at her fingers, and the faint touch of red that was there. The same red that Zackel quickly ascertained was spattered on the ground in front of her and leading around the corner.

"Blood?" Zackel said, wanting to be sure.

"If it bleeds, we can kill it." Rielle said, standing up. "Zackel, turn off the rest of your traps. I don't want to go setting them off."

"Whatever we're chasing could…"

"Just DO IT." Rielle said, her tone clear that she wasn't going to take any dissertation.

"…all right." Zackel said, reaching out. While modifying the traps was difficulty, simply shutting them off was not. All it took was a few quick gestures and an act of will.

"It's done." Zackel said, having felt the sensation of his traps turning off as faint taps on the back of his skull.

"Then we hunt." Rielle said, standing up and following the blood trail. Zackel once again followed after her, and as he did, his mind turned back to the issue at hand.

There HAD been something in there with them. Something of flesh and newly spilled blood. Something that had avoided all his traps…because it were too short?

Then…HAD he set off his own trap several nights before, due to his own stress?

Had all the voices in his head been just that, in his head?

And if something was in there with them, how had they avoided…?

Rielle's gesturing hand broke Zackel out of his train of thought. Having got his attention, Rielle pointed to the ground in front of them, and then at the room to their front and left. The blood trail ran into it…it being the same room with the hidden door behind the bookcase, and the strange room with its incomprehensible markings it led to.

"Come on." Rielle whispered. "We'll charge in. Be ready for anything."

"All right." Zackel said, gathering his power. Rielle got her axe into an optimum defensive position, as the pair crept over to the doorway as quietly as they could. Rielle held up one hand again, extending four fingers and then using them to count down.

On one, they erupted through the door.

Zackel wasn't sure what he expected to see when he charged into the room with Rielle.

He hadn't expected it to be nothing at all.

The two drew up almost as soon as they've charged into the room. Said room was as abandoned as ever, with the rotting bookcase still placed in front of the hidden door. There was no monster, no corpse, no sign that anyone had actually slipped into the room beforehand.

"What the FEL?" Rielle cursed, her head jerking around. Zackel looked up, seized by the odd thought he might see a ladder or a rope. But nothing was in the stairway passage the room lurked below of, and as Zackel turned around, nothing had snuck in behind them.

"NO! It was IN HERE! THE TRAIL…!" Rielle almost screamed.

"…the trail." Zackel said, turning his eyes to the blood traces they'd followed into the room.

Which immediately jerked left, to the wall next to the door. A small pool of blood was there, but no body. Zackel blinked, even as he realized whatever they'd chased had hidden to the side of the door and used their tunnel vision against them, immediately heading back out of the room even as they realized it was empty.

"…trick. Come on Rielle…!" Zackel said, heading back out of the room. Much to Zackel's lack of surprise, there was not a fresh route of blood spatters to follow.

"It doubled back on its own tracks." Zackel said.

"Great. MOVE!" Rielle said, pushing past Zackel and stalking back the way she'd come, noting the smears and faint new traces that indicated the mystery creature's backward passage and trying to determine where the new break-off point might be. For a moment, Zackel almost considered turning his traps back on, and then decided that it would probably not be worth it if Rielle triggered one again. Instead, he followed the warrior once more.

"Almost got you, you shit. Got a lot of…" Rielle muttered, turning the corner, ready for a possible attack. None came, and Rielle continued re-tracing her steps, Zackel behind her.

He almost didn't see it, as they walked past the stairs. The movement caught the corner of his eye, causing him to stop.

"Rielle!"

"What?" Rielle said, turning around as Zackel turned to face the stairs. "The basement?"

"…no." Zackel said, looking at the basement door. They were locks on both sides, and Zackel had locked the 'outside basement' locks ever since the last time he'd explored the makeshift tomb he and Rielle had made of it. There was no way anyone could have opened the door from inside the basement without causing clear damage, damage Rielle would have surely seen. "The stairs."

"The stairs? I don't…" Rielle said, heading over to the stairs and looking at them. Zackel saw her shoulders tense up a second later.

"You may be right." Rielle said, pointing at the stairs. Zackel walked over and crouched down, taking in the faint spot of blood on the dirty stone steps, nearly indistinguishable from said grime. "It's gone up to our room."

"Yeah, up to our…" Zackel said, as Rielle started up the stairs, clearing the smaller flight in two big steps and turning onto the rightward next flight. Zackel began following her up…

Then he stopped, as the wheels in his brain turned some more, and he turned away from Rielle and towards the wall behind him. It took the draenei a few seconds to notice.

"Zackel what are you doing?"

"Saw something." Zackel said, looking at the wall.

"What?" Rielle said, heading back down the stairs. "Saw SOMETHING?"

"…I…" Zackel said. "Movement. Wrong kind of movement."

"WHAT?"

"…Rielle, how could something hide in a building with us…for weeks…and not have us notice it?" Zackel said, as he began acting on an inkling and began feeling along the wall. "Even if they were good at hiding, the odds of one of us never even stumbling over them is…"

"So what, we're back to a ghost?"

"No…no quite Rielle…but…" Zackel said, continuing his explorations. "I thought I saw movement on this wall. As in, the _wall_ moved. And the only way, when it comes down to it, that something physical could avoid us so long…"

His fingers found the switch, camouflaged perfectly against the rest of the stone blocks. With a sense of grim satisfaction, Zackel pushed it in.

A low grinding noise confirmed his suspicion, even as segment of the wall slid open towards the pair. The flash of movement Zackel had thought he'd seen had reminded him very much of a door closing. The same door he'd just found and opened.

"Is if they knew something we didn't." Zackel said.

"…what the fel…?" Rielle said, walking around and peering into the gloom beyond the hidden door. "Can't see…"

"Torch." Zackel said, sprinting down the stairs and grabbing the nearest one off the wall. Rielle took it as he returned, thrusting it into the gloom. As it turned out, the room inside was so small that Rielle would have had trouble fitting inside, which made sense considering the only thing inside it was a pit in the floor.

"…the fel is this?" Rielle said.

"Old castles like this tended to have a secret passage or three, in case of various troubles. Helps the nobility get out in times of crisis and all that, and hard as hell to find if you don't know they're there." Zackel said, looking over Rielle's shoulder and at the hole. And as he did, another puzzle piece clicked into place.

"…of course." Rielle said, looking at the hole and the rusted metal rungs she could vaguely see going down it. "Damn, I don't know if I can fit…"

"You're not going down there." Zackel said, reaching over and stealing the torch.

"What the…hey! Zackel!" Rielle said, turning towards the mage as he backed up. "Are you HONESTLY trying some chivalry bullshit? NOW?"

"No. You don't have to go down there. Because I know where that pit leads." Zackel said, pushing the hidden stone door closed.

"What? The basement?"

"If what I remember about the layout of this place is right…not exactly."

"Layout?" Rielle said, her eyes shifting upward as she did her own mental calculations. As she did that, Zackel walked over to the basement door, leaning his staff against the wall as he undid the locks.

"…wait…the structure doesn't match…" Rielle said. "Wall would be too thick to…"

"Precisely. The way this building lines up, putting a passage straight down into the basement wouldn't work. It would be so deep into the basement wall this wall lines up with that the door would be nearly impossible to open." Zackel said, opening the basement door and snatching his staff up. Casting his light on the stairs, he carefully made his way down.

Arriving at the bottom gave him his final confirmation. He'd finally remembered something he'd observed but not realized at the time. He and Rielle had thrown five ogre corpses down into the basement. When he'd first investigated it, there had only been three.

Now there were none.

"…the bodies." Rielle said.

"Yeah." Zackel said, as his eyes fell on one of the basement's walls. "That settles it."

"I should have come down here…"

"Hindsight is everything, Rielle." Zackel said, flexing his fingers as he began drawing on his power. "Now, a few hidden passages and being short of stature, which would probably help considering how small that passage _was_, that could explain away something hiding away from us, always missing my traps, but the last part, the part with the missing bodies, combined with where that secret door and hole down into the basement was positioned, well, the only way all that works is if that's not frozen earth beyond that wall, but rather, _another room."_

Rielle was about to push past Zackel and take a swing at the wall when she felt the temperature drop again, this time so severely she swore she almost got frostbite.

"So…" Zackel said, and thrust out his hand. Radiating lances of ice leapt from it, spiraling out and impaling into various segments of the wall, the points inside re-erupting into dense hooks that dug into the stone. Zackel narrowed his eyes. It was time for the hard part.

"KNOCK KNOCK." Zackel said, and yanked his ice-hooks backwards.

Some of the wall stayed. The part that made up the hidden door broke apart as Zackel tore it off its 'hinges'. A cloud of ancient dust rushed out, engulfing and coating the pair standing at the foot of the stairs. Zackel managed to avoid coughing, even when the smell rushed in on the dust's heels, an extraordinarily foul odor of rot and worse. He gave the torch a touch of magic to make sure it didn't go out, and brought his staff to the ready. Rielle did likewise, raising her axe behind him, even as Zackel cast the torch forward.

The darkness fell away, revealing what lay within the hidden room.

"Rarrrrhhhhhhhh!" Came the voice, causing Zackel to take a step back, even as his eyes fell on the sound's maker.

An ogre.

A very small ogre, holding a sword he clearly had trouble lifting. Zackel blinked, looking at the ogre.

The second sound it made confirmed it to Zackel, as the ogre unleashed what it clearly hoped was an intimidating roar, and instead produced another reedy, angry yell that didn't sound very impressive. It was a child.

And, as Zackel recovered from his surprise, he realized it wasn't alone.

"Ogres?" Rielle said, stepping around Zackel, the confusion clear in her voice. Zackel didn't reply, instead taking another step forward and trying to see more into the room.

The child ogre charged, dragging its weapon behind it. Zackel felt Rielle tense up.

"Wait." Zackel said, snapping his staff in front of the draenei. Amazingly, she did, even as Zackel jerked the staff back towards the child ogre. _"Sontar."_

Ice erupted around the child ogre's legs, freezing it in place and causing it to topple over. Another ice burst froze its hands to the ground, preventing it from getting back up. It continued to yell and scream, but Zackel ignored it, stepping forward some more to see what the child ogre was protecting.

More ogres. The hidden room that had existed behind the wall had concealed a nest of them. But, as the child ogre had demonstrated, there wasn't a single adult male among them. Only children, and a few larger forms that Zackel was fairly certain were females. Zackel didn't need to see how the females were trying to get the children behind them to know what they were.

"…women and children." Zackel said, casting the torch around to make absolutely sure that there were no adult or battle-ready ogres. He was correct: the only grown ogres were the females, and while Zackel wouldn't have liked to have gotten into a fistfight with one or all of them, he was fairly certain he could have struck them all down with the power he had before they got within five feet of him.

"…what?" Rielle said, looking back at Zackel. "What are they doing…?"

"They must have been taken down here when the ogres attacked me. They didn't know the degree of the threat, so they were protecting the weaker…maybe?" Zackel said. He didn't know a lot about ogres overall, but he did recall that different clans had been observed trying new things they'd learned while on Azeroth. Considering the Crushridge Clan had been in constant battle with the far-from-honorable Syndicate, it made sense that they'd try and keep the 'vulnerable' part of their population tucked away when fights broke out. "When the storm started…your taunt."

"What?"

"You yelled down into the basement to bring up any hiding ogres. The one that came up…must have been their guard. When you killed it, when we threw all the bodies down here…"

"They hid? In this room?" Rielle said. "How did they know it was there?"

"They live here. Must have discovered it earlier." Zackel said. "Ogres…aren't as universally dumb as many people think."

"…but why did they stay hiding down here for…weeks…" Rielle said, as she realized what her 'smoking out' tactic had done. She also didn't know much about ogres, but she knew that their cultures tended to revolve around strength. Between slaying their protector, and throwing the bodies down into the basement, she and Zackel must have seemed terrifying. And when the storm kept them from leaving…

"No choice." Zackel said, peering around at the ogres again. His eyes noticed a particular one, staring at Zackel with clear defiant terror. What set it apart from the other children was the dirty, bloodsoaked rag on its leg. Noticing his gaze, one of the female ogres (if that was what they were, as female ogre sightings were so rare that Zackel couldn't recall any information about them off the top of his head) moved in front of it, glaring at Zackel with harsh, but weary eyes.

It was the clear dullness in that protective gaze that drove it home to Zackel, as well as the bones he'd realized were scattered all over the floor inside the hidden room. He knew then why the child ogre had been sneaking around the castle. And where the ogre corpses in the basement had gone.

"…no food." Zackel said, causing Rielle to glance at him. "If they had any food down here, they must have ran out…maybe even within a few days. That's what the flickers of motion were, the odd events that we couldn't place. One of the children sneaking around, trying to find more food. When they couldn't…they had to eat what they had available."

Rielle looked back at the ogres, glancing around. The wince that briefly passed over her features indicated that even she realized what the ogres had gone through to survive, including eating their own dead. Clearly even that had not been enough, from the trace of lethargy the assumedly-female ogres were showing. They were weak from lack of sustenance, and Zackel doubted they could put up much of a fight no matter how much they wanted to.

"So this is our ghost." Rielle said quietly.

"Yeah. Hiding ogres. Mixed with a whole bunch of bad coincidences." Zackel replied, as he tried to think of what to do now.

"…all right then." Rielle said. "Let's make it quick."

Zackel started to reply, when Rielle's words fully sunk in.

"What?" Zackel said, as Rielle raised her axe and began to approach the hidden ogres. Zackel stared, the shocked surprise that slammed into him nearly paralyzing his vocal cords.

"Wh-…RIELLE WAIT! What are you doing?"

Rielle stopped, and Zackel heard her take a long, slow breath.

"This is our problem, Zackel. We have to solve it."

"Solve it? You mean…"

"YES, YOU IDIOT. THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT I MEAN." Rielle said, turning around and directing a fierce, angry gaze towards the mage. "We found their hidey-hole. There's nothing else we CAN do."

"…Rielle…are you serious?"

"Serious? SERIOUS? ARE YOU COMPLETELY BRAIN DEAD, MAGE?" Rielle snapped. "You think this is something that can be solved with understanding and acceptance? THESE ARE OGRES. They LIVE for war, death, and destruction! It's ALL THEY KNOW."

"They're women and children!"

"You think that will make a difference? Don't you know how dangerous cornered animals are?"

"These aren't animals, they're not…!"

"No, mage. Do NOT start this. Not now." Rielle said, her tone low and dangerous. "There's a lot to you I can understand and tolerate, but this is NOT a situation where your bleeding heart will help. It will get us killed. So I'm going to solve the problem before it gets worse."

"They're…"

"OGRES, mage. Not Alliance, not Horde, OGRES. They kill everything they can, and laugh while doing it. That's the way they were on Draenor, and that's the way they've remained on Azeroth. Their gender and age are meaningless in the end. Not when they can't hide any more." Rielle said. "I do not do this out of cruelty, or hate, or mindless fear. I do this because I KNOW IT'S WHAT'S NEEDED. And if you can't stomach it…well, I'll do it alone." The draenei said, turning around towards the ogres again. She felt the deep pang of regret bloom in her chest, multiple stripes of it running across her heart, but she swiftly shoved it down, bringing her cold, practical mindset to the fore.

Then a new cold washed over her. This time, it wasn't just a sudden chill. It as like ice had formed claws and raked them over her skin.

"Stop." Zackel whispered.

Rielle narrowed her eyes, turning her face back towards Zackel, who was now holding his staff up, misty blue power swirling around it. The mage watched the dranei's face, hoping against hope…

And when the seething anger returned, Zackel felt his own deep clench of regret. But, like Rielle, he forced it down. Some things were the casualty of the greater good.

"…are you serious." Rielle said quietly.

"You will not hurt them." Zackel said, gathering more energy.

"…are you _THIS WEERKAUY STUPID, MAGE?_ You'll side with OGRES? Over ME?" Rielle snapped.

"I will side with the helpless, to prevent mistakes from being made. If that is in itself a mistake…I'll take the blame. And whatever the consequences may be." Zackel said. "But until that happens…I won't let you hurt them, Rielle."

Rielle snorted dismissively, lifting her axe.

"You think you have any say in the matter now, ZACK?"

"…I'll do what I have to."

"You think you can stop me? _You_?" Rielle sneered.

"…….I'll do what I have to." Zackel said, his tone quiet and sad.

Rielle looked at the mage, cocking her head at his expression. Zackel returned her gaze, watching a gamut of emotions cross her features, before it finally settled on cold, angry disgust.

"…you're hopeless." Rielle said, lowering her axe. "You're just…just…"

Rielle stalked towards Zackel, shoving him out of the way and storming up the stairs behind him. Zackel heard the basement door tear open and then slam shut, the sound causing him to slump his shoulders. The regret bore down on him again, a crushing weight of broken possibilities.

He only allowed it a few seconds before he pushed it away. The ogres had not disappeared, and after what he'd sacrificed to hold onto what he believed was right, he was loathe to have it been for nothing.

"Ogres." Zackel said, taking a step forward towards the hidden clan remnants, who were clearly confused at just what had happened. Even the child he'd frozen to the floor had gone quiet.

Zackel dispelled the ice he'd used on the defending ogre, allowing it to scramble up and back towards its peers.

"Do…you…understand…me?" Zackel said. He knew ogres spoke Low Common for the most part, which would force him to address them in simple, slow terms. "I…will…not…hurt…you."

"…why?" One of the females asked, its voice a dull croak.

"…I…did…not…know…you…here. Not…enemy…" Zackel said. "Unless…you…make…me…enemy."

Zackel looked around at the mess inside the hidden room, and again felt sorrow over what he'd inadvertently made the creatures do. Ogres may have almost always tended towards being savage, monstrous brutes, who gladly would have roasted him over a cooking fire…but even they probably had been loathe to eat the corpses of their fallen men-folk, until they'd had no choice. He'd done that to them, not to mention being the one who'd killed them. Despite the strong extenuating circumstances, Zackel still felt considerable remorse over it all.

"…Boy." Zackel said, indicating the ogre child with the filthy, blood-soaked dressing. "You…the one? Wander…around…castle? We…chase…you?"

The ogre child stared for several moments, before giving a slow nod.

"…come…here." Zackel said, leaning his staff against the wall before slowly reaching into his robe. The female ogres bristled at the motion.

"No…I…help." Zackel said, drawing one of his few remaining healing potions. "Heal…where hurt."

"No!" One of the other female ogres said. "Trick!"

"…bandage…dirty. Could…make sick." Zackel said, holding up the healing potion. "Heal…water. Not…poison."

To try and drive the point home, Zackel uncorked the tincture and drank some of it himself, feeling the liquid tingle in his stomach as it tried to seek wounds that weren't there.

"See?" Zackel said. "Help…where hurt."

The child ogre still seemed wary, but ultimately came over to Zackel. Despite himself, Zackel did not drop his guard as he knelt down, removed the bandage and dripped several drops of the elixir into the ugly gash Zackel's trap had made on his leg. The wound began to close up, though the child ogre clearly didn't notice in his haste to get away from Zackel. Zackel stood back up, replacing the potion in his robes and picking up his staff again.

"…stay…down…here." Zackel said. "I…give you food…and water. Will leave…on stairs…every day." Zackel said. He held out his staff, and much to the ogre's astonishment, began manifesting bread and water containers on the floor in front of him. Zackel did that for nearly two minutes straight, the process draining him a fair bit but also assuaging his guilt. Some might have said that he had no reason to feel guilty, but Zackel had never been the type to dismiss things easily, even when he should have.

"…Storm…end soon." Zackel said. "When it…end…we leave. I…tell you before. You…can leave then. But…must stay down here. No more…sneak…or hide. STAY….DOWN HERE." Zackel said, finally putting a note of warning threat into his tone. "If…find any of you…in castle…even one…will not stop her again. She…kill you all. So…STAY. DOWN. HERE."

Zackel looked around at the hidden ogres, who seemed to understand. Whether Zackel could trust them or not, he really didn't know. But he'd meant what he'd said. If they bit the hand that had literally fed them, he would not stay Rielle's a second time. Otherwise…he meant the rest of what he had said as well.

Zackel cast his torch over the basement once more, again looking at the many scattered bones that had once been adult ogres.

"…I…sorry." Zackel said quietly, and turned to leave. He made it back up the stairs without incident.

He was mildly worried, when he tried the basement door, that he would find it was locked.

* * *

As it had turned out, the basement door was not locked.

The door leading to Zackel and Rielle's sleeping quarters was. Worse, Zackel's furs were haphazardly tossed on the floor in front of the door. The sight of them almost kept Zackel from trying the door and confirming that it was indeed locked.

Rielle had kicked him out.

Zackel stared at the door, dully realizing the problem. While he could make food, all his other items, including all his alchemy material (he'd wanted to make some glue to seal the hidden door on the stairs, just in case) were in the room, and considering the way his furs were lying outside the door, he doubted Rielle was going to let him have them. There was also the problem that the fireplace was inside the room, the room he had gone to considerable effort to seal off so the heat wouldn't leak out. The rest of the castle, while not freezing, was hardly pleasant…

…and she'd KICKED HIM OUT.

"…Rielle…I mean, come on…" Zackel said, mostly to himself. "We solved the mystery, you helped me with…why did you have to insist that the ogres had to die? Are you really so…we were…why did…"

And for the first time in a while, Zackel felt anger bloom inside him.

"…no. No, no, NO." Zackel hissed. This was ridiculous, and beyond the pale. Even taking into account the danger of ogres, Rielle should have seen more than enough of the world to know that you should never cast such a wide judgment. If there had been injured or sick male ogres hiding down in the room, then maybe she might have had a point…but there hadn't been, and Zackel was certain that the ogres had not been hiding them away. There had been nothing but women and children, near-helpless unless completely cornered, forced to hide and starve…and she'd wanted to _kill them?_ Because they MIGHT have been a threat?

Just like she'd thrown away everything they'd built because of how he'd chosen to interact with the Horde, before they'd even met? Even AFTER he'd explained the misconception she'd had that had fueled said anger? And after he'd made it clear he wouldn't let her make a snap judgment, she'd done the equivalent of packing her bags and taking off?

Was _that _what she thought of him in the end?

No. Enough was enough. This door couldn't hold him, and she knew it, and Zackel had _HAD IT._ He'd given her inch after inch, considering how much of this was his fault, and she'd shown herself to not be deserving any of it…

…and that didn't make sense.

"…uggghhhhh." Zackel said, putting a hand up against his face. "….wait. If…"

The anger rumbled in his ears, demanding he stop thinking. He always over-thought everything, and this wasn't a situation that needed or deserved it. Rielle had seemed like a pretty decent girl, but her ugly side had come out, and it was too ugly for this to continue…

Except it didn't make sense to him. Rielle had shown flashes of a bad side, and they hadn't agreed with everything…but it shouldn't have lead to THIS.

How could it? He'd meant what he'd said, back on the stairs less than a half hour before. The good in her outweighed the bad…

Then again, he'd been so troubled by his own problems that maybe he'd made the wrong judgment, or missed things…

Or maybe the cabin fever was getting to Rielle, and she was making her own snap judgments. She'd seemed to have calmed down since last night…

But last night had just been some angry threats. Now she'd almost ATTACKED him…

_Enough of this. You've been abused and belittled enough by that girl. ESPECIALLY after all you've done. It's time to make a stand. If you have to do it by kicking her off her perch, it's nothing she hasn't earned…_

"…no." Zackel said, trying to cool his head, literally and metaphorically. Even if Rielle had turned out to be a bad seed, he couldn't follow down her path and start making decisions based on how angry he felt. In the end…that cure would be worse than the disease.

How he'd handled Jasciona had proven that. Some situations did not suit emotions well. He would approach this from a logical perspective.

And his initial steps were already telling him that there would be a lot of them. Things were not adding up. Revealing the hidden ogres did not answer all the questions, especially when it came to Rielle's actions.

There was something else, and he had to find it. If only to confirm whether or not it was actually there. Based on that…he'd figure out the proper, final way to deal with Rielle.

If everything failed, it wasn't going to be because he had.

"…all right, Rielle." Zackel said, picking up his furs. He wasn't speaking with the expectation that the draenei could hear him, and he didn't really care if she could or not. "Whether you deserve it, or not, you get one last inch."

Zackel turned, heading down the stairs. He'd have to figure out which room was best to sleep in. He'd also need to figure out a new privy. Then the real questions would begin.

"…I hope you do. I really do." Zackel whispered, and then fell completely silent as he arrived at the ground floor and began looking around.

* * *

In the room, Rielle watched the fire, feeling like she was looking into a mirror. She was silent herself, watching the wood burn.

It was dawning on her just what her situation was now. If she hadn't been trapped before, she was now. Alone.

…just like always. Why should this be any different?

"…stupid mage." Rielle said, and kept watching the fire.

But no matter how much wood she put on it, or how close she got, it couldn't chase away the chill.


	21. A Puzzle of Flesh

Chapter 21: A Puzzle of Flesh

"Entry Whatever, I can't remember and I don't have my journal to write in, anyway." Zackel said, sitting in the room he'd selected as the best of the bad lot he now had. Sleeping that night hadn't been much fun, but it had forced Zackel to shore up an aspect of his magic he was very rusty in: fire. While he'd told Rielle why he didn't like it very much, he had not forgotten its use as a tool. He'd just _mostly _forgotten, and hence had to work for nearly four hours the previous night to produce a small, constant flame for heat. It wasn't close to their fireplace, but it was better than nothing, and between it, his furs, and how much he'd exhausted himself in re-learning the basics of fire manifestation, he'd slept like the dead.

He'd half-hoped he'd wake up to Rielle kicking him, throwing insults his way and demanding that he make her another meal, or something in that vein. While he really wasn't in the mood to prostrate himself in front of her any more, it would indicate that she was back to the girl he thought he knew: prone to bullying and slave-driving, but mostly to a superficial degree that she was really only utilizing because it was Zackel's fault she was stuck there. Such actions didn't match her recent ones, where she'd become angry, spiteful, and close-mindedly judgmental, throwing punishments his way, telling him there was nothing he could do to stop them, and throwing him out of their sleeping quarters when they couldn't see eye to eye on a vital issue. Personally, if it meant that his initial assessment of the woman had been correct and she was just having some very bad days she'd come back from (as she'd seemed to be on the stairs the day before, before the ogres and the new wedge that was driven between them), he'd have even tolerated doing a little more prostrating.

Just a little. The last little bit.

Unfortunately, it seemed like this new/true mindset was still in play, as Zackel woke up on his own, and upon investigating the door upstairs, found it still locked up tight. Zackel had returned to his furs with a sigh, sitting on them and pondering where to start.

After a few supplementary issues had been addressed, like marking the end of the jewel in his staff with soot in case he needed to (properly) write on the wall, as well as opening the basement door and leaving the daily food supply for the ogres (who Zackel did not see, but could hear below, faintly, and who he had heard coming up the stairs once he'd closed, locked, and put his ear to the door), Zackel had sat down, crossing his legs and briefly reaching for his journal before he realized it wasn't there. Having realized that, he closed his eyes and began thinking.

For a long while, the only noise was his occasional rustles and the howl of the wind outside.

"…I am Rielle…" Zackel said after a time, quietly and to himself, raising a finger as he began writing on the air, as if recording the data and hypotheses he'd mentally gathered. "I am a warrior. I am probably prone to aggression by nature…and my training has likely done nothing but increase that, even as it refined it…would my training cause me to constantly subconsciously generate aggression…would it require a steady source of targets for said aggression…said source is provided by adventurer lifestyle…source is cut off due to being trapped here. Attempting to compensate with constant exercise, combat drills, sparring…compensation beginning to lose effectiveness? Was careful to not harm the 'squishy' wizard during said sparring…cause of loss of effect, maybe? Additional cause?"

* * *

It had been a long time since Rielle had done the one-handed handstand pushups. In truth, Rielle had always found them to be more trouble then they were worth. There were other exercises and techniques that were easier to do and had just as good results.

But easy wasn't doing it for her. Not any more. So Rielle balanced and pressed her own weight up and down, her body soaked with sweat and her arm feeling like she was holding it in a fire. Rielle kept going, preferring the physical ache in her muscle to the far more complicated sensations inside herself.

Unfortunately, it also kept her from realizing her arm was giving out. When it did, she nearly landed on her face, painfully wrenching her shoulder and banging her jaw in the process.

"Argh! SON OF A…!' Rielle cursed, rolling over and checking her arm, Unlike Zackel earlier, she hadn't dislocated it…

And for some reason, that just made her angrier. Pushing herself back up with her better arm, Rielle immediately launched into a series of crunches, something that was specifically difficult for her species to do due to the way their legs curved. Rielle did them anyway, even as her muscles protested and her bones ached.

But, like last time, eventually her legs simply couldn't keep up with her need, and Rielle collapsed on the furs around her, sweat running down her face.

"…damn it all." Rielle said, before reaching for her water bottle. The fact that it was empty nearly caused her to throw it into the fire.

* * *

"I am aware of my skills…I am driven to improve them." Zackel said, still sitting down and thinking out loud. "I like improving them…constant improvement requires constant new stimuli…lack of new stimuli a factor here? The mage, aka me attempted to provide her with whatever alterations in her routine I could…insufficient in amount? Misplaced blame due to frustration over perceived notion that skills will atrophy if not constantly give new feedback? Again the notion that the environment cannot provide me with what I want…environment is due to my, the mage's, actions…this 'diminishing returns' factor causing her initial sharp actions to become more constant and definite?"

Zackel took a bite out of his conjured bread roll, chewing the airy food until it had virtually vanished in his mouth like cotton candy, thinking all the while.

"Compare current environment to previous one. Where did I come from, from before…"

* * *

It took every bit of willpower Rielle had to not swing the axe into the wall. She knew that if she started doing that, she'd risk upsetting the carefully sealed heat-containment Zackel had tried to craft…

Yet part of her wanted to do it anyway. She didn't need the mage. She'd slept out in the field in Wintergrasp, and she hadn't died or gotten sick there. A little lost heat wouldn't matter…

And, as she swung at the air with her axe, going through her long-memorized combat routines, the lack of anything to actually STRIKE was really starting to get to her. Drills lost something after you went through them for the tenth time: you needed to actually hit something after a while. A sparring partner, a training dummy, a tree, anything would do. If all you did was shadowbox, then you might find that anything more firm than a shadow would throw you off guard.

Nothing was worse in life then being thrown off guard.

Guarding was something Rielle had learned well. Something people like Zackel could never appreciate. They always hid behind the likes of her, expected her to take the blows. Cowards and idiots, the lot of them…

Except, without Zackel there, she had no ice to strike, or no one to wrestle…

Just her own shadow. And it was as poor a companion as it always was.

Rielle wiped sweat from her eyes as these thoughts occurred to her, and then she buried them again and launched into the maneuvers once more. Life was hard. You had to be harder.

Screw Zackel and all his musing. She was the real one who knew the nature of ice. She had learned that, when the chips were down, you'd always be called on to be just like it.

* * *

"I was at the location called Wintergrasp before I came here…I was not assigned there, I went of my own free will…" Zackel said. "I do not like the Horde…but I did not initially show such intense dislike that that is the sole reason…I do not seem to be interested in money or glory…I am interested in skill…what else am I interested in…"

"_Hey. Pigeon." Rielle said, a dozen feet away with axe in hand. "Forget the small fry. Real meat's over here."_

"…I am willing to risk my life for others. I have a sense of duty." Zackel said. "I was betrayed by someone who did not share my honor…I was unable to not just seek revenge, but fulfill my duties…have I forgiven my companion the mage for being of the same 'calling' as the one who betrayed me, but subconsciously begun to direct new resentment towards him because he, and Sparse, kept me from fulfilling my duties…said resentment becomes funneled through the aspect that dislikes the Horde, and causes over-reactions to issues involving the Horde on the mage's side? Am I seeking an excuse to vent? Did said excuse become something worse when faced with a worse problem, like the discovery of the ogres and the divide on how they needed to be dealt with? Do I _need _something to release my darker impulses, as the better of two bad options?"

* * *

Meditation and self-reflection was not a big part of warrior training, but Rielle had learned a touch of it in her time, from her original teacher and some of her peers. It wasn't really in her nature to utilize it: she preferred to face her problems head on, or go out and enjoy herself instead of brooding on them. She did not have that option here, and all her extensive exercising and training was not helping. So, she sat, the fire flickering low, her breathing slow and adjusted.

Her mind, however, could not match her body. Every time she tried to drift away, something would make her recall Zackel. While she'd tolerated it at first, as the mage was the source of all of her irritation, the fact that she couldn't seem to get away from him gradually began to weigh onto her every thought.

"This is _BULLSHIT."_ Rielle finally said, pulling herself up and storming towards the door.

Before stopping abruptly, realizing she had no idea what she was going to do, or what she wanted to do. What she wanted was peace of mind, but the mage was the root of the reason why she DIDN'T have it. Why else would he keep invading her thoughts…

"…_WEERKUAY!"_ Rielle cursed, punching the wall before she stalked back over to her furs to try the meditation again.

* * *

"…I was angry and resentful towards the mage when we first met. I had just suffered several indignities, producing understandable anger. Time cooled the anger, and I befriended the mage…" Zackel said, before his eyes slowly opened.

He'd come to the part that he had slowly realized had been his biggest blind spot. Between flashbacks to that day in Stormwind, and the stress that the hiding ogres had inadvertently caused him, Zackel hadn't really paid much attention, or given much thought, to certain ways that Rielle had acted towards him. Now, though, he had to try and address it.

"I…might have had some…stronger feelings for the mage. Exactly what is the source of these feelings…could be numerous. General urges that did not require anything except a release, like the other men I have claimed to be with…the idea of enjoying someone's company, and wanting to attempt a new stage of the enjoyment with no strings attached, as I, the mage, have done a few times myself, like with Nekola…a false sense of closeness brought on by the confined quarters and the lack of anyone else to interact with…or perhaps a test of character for the mage to try something and be struck down, in several possible fashions, in order to establish a pecking order. The mage, for his own reasons, did not act on any of the offers or lures…frustration over a refusal to follow the plan? Frustration over obliviousness?…Possible deeper feelings that make me feel vulnerable, causing me to lash out? Possible…mental issues that the circumstances have brought to the forefront?"

Zackel paused to drink some water, turning the last train of thought he'd had over in his head.

"Possible biological issues like menstruation trouble also somewhat feasible, though they do not explain everything. Then again, nothing theorized explains everything." Zackel said. "I am Rielle…why have I become so angry and irrational…what has _Zackel _done to make me so angry and irrational…"

The mage went silent, sinking deep into thought.

"…there is nothing I did, within reason, to make her that angry. All reasons presented do not explain this sudden, repeated, snapback…especially with all previous interactions. I, the mage, may not be a mind reader, nor perfect in my ability to read people…but I do not think I could have misread her so badly that I am now pondering what is wrong with her when this is her supposed 'true self'. If I don't accept this is how she really is…then I need to find out not only why she's acted this way, but why now. There is an X-factor…"

Zackel's self-monologue was broken by an abrupt yawn. Zackel rubbed his eyes, wondering just how long he'd been engaged in his mental calisthenics and how deep he'd been in them to not notice his weariness sneaking up on him. Having hit a dead end, he decided he'd sleep on it.

"Will continue tomorrow." Zackel said, lying down and wrapping himself in his furs.

* * *

Rielle's eyes jerked open, and she stared at the dull remains of the fire for a few seconds before she began hammering at the side of her head.

"I-just-want-to-SLEEP! Is that SO WRONG?" Rielle said. "I don't care if he's wrong or I'm wrong any more! I want to SLEEP!"

The silence of the room settled back down onto the draenei, as she sat up and buried her face in one hand. Her sleep was not plagued by nightmares, not so much. Instead, her brain just seemed to refuse to shut down, filling her dreams with constant, chaotic streams of random data that didn't make any sense even in the bizarre tendency of dreams. What drove her completely nuts was that she couldn't tell if the strangeness were actual dreams or a sort of semi-lucid nonsense that was spilling over all her thoughts because her brain was stuck between a state where it couldn't fully settle into the lowered state sleep consisted of and had started to already do it despite that fact, causing her 'higher-conscious' mind to try and 'properly' interpret all the signals of the 'lowered-conscious' one brains entered when they slept. Worse was the fact she hadn't had this problem last night: she'd slept fitfully but dreamlessly.

A day stuck in the room all alone clearly wasn't what her mind cared for, but Rielle was not so worn down that she planned to give in. Maybe Zackel hadn't met her then, in regards to how he'd handled the Forsaken at Tarren Mills, but his forcing her (wait what) to not deal with the ogre problem was too much of a slap in her face for her to take. If she went to confront him, she might not be able to prevent herself from strangling him…

_Besides he was a pathetic wretch, she could wait him out, he'd come crawling back to her…_

Except she knew that for all the things she'd come to despise about him, she knew that there was a core of strength buried in the mage, and he'd just HAD to seize onto it when it came time for an issue that so bitterly divided them…

_And why would she want him to crawl back anyway…_

Yet they'd disagreed before, why did she have to be such a stickler for…

"…this isn't me." Rielle said. "The me I know would want sleep. So I am GETTING. SOME. SLEEP. DEAL WITH IT."

Rielle rolled over and closed her eyes, calmly but firmly trying to turn her brain off.

Eventually, she succeeded.

But as consciousness returned to her, Rielle found the issues waiting with it.

* * *

"Entry somethingorother, still stumped, yeah." Zackel muttered, before he experienced a deep shiver. He wasn't doing too badly in surviving down in the not-properly-heated lower levels of the Alterac fortress, but he was far from comfortable.

Whether his lack of comfort was due to the cold or from what he was currently facing, he couldn't say. In front of him, the hidden door loomed.

Well, in a sense. The bookcase was still propped up against it, which somewhat lessened the atmosphere caused by the concealed passage. But the possibilities of what lay within was enough for Zackel to feel a sense of menace. With all the other issues, the room and the writing on its walls had fallen down the list of Zackel's mental efforts. With the coming day, though, Zackel had returned to it.

"Going to re-investigate the concealed room with fresh perspective." Zackel said, walking up to the bookcase. "If there is an X-factor here…this seems like the most likely provider of it."

The bookcase, however, was heavier and more awkward than Zackel recalled it being. Without anyone to help him move it (Zackel doubted he could talk either Rielle or the ogres into lending their aid), Zackel struggled mightily to get the old piece of furniture out of the way…

And overestimated himself as his back suddenly shrieked with pain. Zackel released his grip on the bookcase, staggering back and putting a hand against his spine.

"This is why I hate hidden doors…" Zackel said, pausing to lean against the wall. For a few moments he debated just smashing or igniting the bookcase, but ultimately decided against it. Such short-sighted thinking never worked out well, no matter how it was applied.

"Okay then…" Zackel said, as he once again tried to move it. It had not gotten any easier. "This is why I hate mysteries…"

With one hard yank, Zackel finally got some traction on the bookcase… too much, as one corner of the furniture caught on the floor. This promptly unbalanced the bookcase's high center of gravity, causing the piece of furniture to begin to tip over.

"OH SHIT!" Zackel yelled, trying to get away.

Too slow.

Albeit in terms of escape. Zackel's ice armor kept the falling bookcase from doing worse than knocking the wind out of him as it landed on him, even as the crash of the falling furniture reverberated through the abandoned fortress. Zackel lay on the floor for a few seconds, pondering the question of whether he should just go back to sleep, maybe right then and there.

"…This is why I hate women…and life…and especially gravity…!" Zackel said, as he began crawling out from beneath the fallen bookcase. Well, at least he didn't have to pick it up: ice-manifestation would do that for him.

Despite its sudden loudness, no one came to investigate the noise.

Zackel wasn't sure if he was relieved or saddened by that fact.

* * *

Whether Rielle would have come was a moot point, as she hadn't heard the sound of the falling bookshelf. She was, much against her better judgment, out on the rooftop.

Said better judgment's complete inability to distract her from the isolation she was in, not to mention the constant reminders of _why _she was isolated, didn't really help. She also harbored no delusions that she could succeed in stopping the storm where Zackel had failed, nor that something would occur along the lines of finding a hidden passage to escape that had eluded both him and her (and in all honesty, despite her less than optimal state, Rielle WOULD have questioned such a thing appearing, especially now). But she needed a distraction, and going out on the roof would provide one.

She hasn't just spent her time in Wintergrasp trying to secure territory and fight the Horde. She'd tried to pick up from her differently-talented peers the ability to deduct the weather, current and future, which was vital not only in Wintergrasp but in all of Northrend. She was certain she'd learned a trick or two in that regard: she just hadn't had need to use it, due to the reason of the storm (that being, Zackel). But with him gone and said storm keeping her stuck here, Rielle had finally braved it to see if she could get her own read on it.

She swiftly regretted even trying. The wind was not only bitterly cold, she couldn't even begin to get a bead on it. It's nature went against every basic thing she'd learned. An artificial creation defying naturally-honed skills.

After a few minutes of trying to, even as the blowing snow and icy gales tried to tear the life from her, Rielle found herself once again cursing magic. Primarily, she cursed its crutch ability to prop up unworthy people, its tendency to completely scramble natural occurrences and prevent her from properly analyzing them, the fact that all her recent troubles were because of it…

And a tiny whisper, forged long before she'd even gone near Northrend and the path that had led here to her prison, opened up with its own bitter song. A song of anger, and regret, and seething jealousy…

Which abruptly shut up when Rielle found herself getting suddenly blown off her feet by the wind.

* * *

The words engraved on the wall were as inscrutable as before.

"What were you trying to tell the world, long-gone carver…" Zackel mused, peering at the dull etchings over the jewel of his staff.

"…_Forever in our hands…burden of choice…star echoes…voice/voices_…_in that…"_

"Forever in our hands…something that was passed down to whoever lived here…?" Zackel said. "Might not be an object or an inheritance…could be something bad, hence requiring a warning…said to be a burden…or something about choice is. Is the choice in picking up something? Or maybe the burden had something to do with it being forever in their hands? Star echoes…stars don't echo…maybe I'm mistranslating or the word has been messed up…start echoes? Echoes…and voice…voices…maybe…voices…?"

Zackel tapped a finger on the wall, re-calling the events of two days past, when he and Rielle had discovered the 'source' of their haunting. Except, given even more time to think…Zackel had begun to realize that child ogres creeping around didn't explain _everything_.

His traps had been avoided by the sneaking child going under its trigger lines…except he hadn't exactly measured how tall the child ogres were. Considering how big ogres could grow, it wouldn't make a huge amount of sense that an ogre with enough development to sneak effectively around a castle to be small enough to avoid setting off his traps by sheer blind luck. Then again, considering they'd nearly discovered them a few times before they actually did, it made sense that the hiding ogre child might have spied him laying down his traps and just taken alternate routes where he could and ducked under the others…

…except it didn't make enough sense that the ogre child could have figured out he'd needed to duck. And even if he had…how had the child both kept low enough to avoid the triggers, yet moved fast enough to outrun both Zackel and Rielle when they'd been chasing him?

Were there more hidden doors and passageways that the two of them hadn't discovered?

Did the ogre child have something left over from the old Alterac kingdom, or perhaps a recovered Dalaran artifact, that had let him avoid or negate his traps?

Or…had Zackel been too quick to dismiss the general concept of a haunting?

Zackel closed his eyes, returning to that possibility. His flip-flopping and mental circles before, back when he'd thought an evil spirit of some sort was the source of his and Rielle's troubles, had been whether outside interference was needed to cause the problems he and Rielle had had, and Rielle might still be having. But, considering the still-apparent holes, and the strange warning on the wall…

Was it possible he'd thrown out the baby with the bathwater? Maybe there wasn't an evil presence in this old fortress…but maybe there was SOMETHING.

Something that had helped the ogre.

Something that may have gotten the wrong idea about Rielle and him, and was reacting accordingly.

Something that…had tried to hide its presence, by obscuring the words written on a wall about it?

Zackel caught himself after his last question, realizing he'd end up in another round of ambagious navel gazing if he didn't watch himself. The issue, whatever it might have been, couldn't be picked apart any more.

"Well then." Zackel said, sitting down and closing his eyes. "Let's clarify."

The mage relaxed, and then attempted to open his mind to the immediate world around him, and anything unusual that might have lurked within it.

_I am Zackel Wintersoul. If you are there, I am not your enemy. I am not the enemy of the ogres either, if you consider yourself with them. I am merely a lost adventurer trying to survive. If you can hear me, if you are there…please speak._

Silence was all Zackel got. He had expected that.

_I do not know your story. I do not know what I may have done wrong. I am not a threat to you, nor do I wish to be. If you are interacting with us…if you are causing these unusual occurrences…then speak. Let us settle this face to face, instead of through all this misunderstanding._

Whether the fortress seemed too quiet now, or if it was always this quiet and Zackel had just become super-sensitive again, he couldn't say.

_I can understand if our initial actions, if what we have lurking within us, has made you fearful. I have darkness within me…as does Rielle. But you have done me a favor, in making me face the darkness. Please…if you are there, speak. Let us solve all our problems. Together. If you're so used to solitude that you cannot trust us…I understand. But whether you wish to break or remain in said isolation here, in this fallen kingdom…it will go much swifter if you do not remain hidden. Please…I am not your enemy. I do not wish…to be anyone's enemy. I just want…things to go well…_

Having run out of words, Zackel sat back and listened.

Hoping he'd hear more than the howl of the wind.

* * *

It wasn't just a howl. It was…laughter.

That was what Rielle would have sworn as she tried to pull herself up on the rooftop, even as she tried to keep her sense of direction and not get lost in the sweeping wall of white. The winds of the storm weren't just clawing at her ears, audibly and benumbingly. They were mocking her, laughing at her helplessness and powerlessness. Maybe it was all in her head, but Rielle would have insisted otherwise.

Especially as she remembered what Zackel had said, all that talk about conversing with the storm, like it was a living entity. Suddenly, that concept didn't seem so out there. And whatever the case might have been, Rielle wasn't going to continue pondering it out in the storm's grip.

She hadn't quite lost the door, and she staggered towards it…as another massive surge of wind blasted from her side, carrying her into one of the protruding blocks of stone that made up the roof-path's structure. Rielle cried out as her shoulder, the same one she'd landed on the previous day, was again painfully jolted. The storm snatched the sound away the moment it left her, the chilling mistral feeling like it was trying to reach into her mouth and pull the air from her lungs, the warm blood from her heart…

Rielle dash-lunged forward, getting back inside the fortress…

As the last hammer of wind caught her back, throwing her off balance. With a scream, Rielle found herself tumbling down the stairs, ending up at their base a sore, freezing heap.

It wasn't that that kept her there. Rielle had had far worse. She'd trained herself to endure far worse.

It was _that _thought, having surged up to join Rielle's constantly chattering brain.

The storm was alive.

It didn't like her.

And considering its relation to Zackel, it might not want to let her leave.

* * *

…Nothing.

Despite all of Zackel's efforts, no voice came to answer his plea. He was as alone in the castle as he was when he'd woken up that morning, and it was clear that whatever could be done to change that, Zackel apparently could not do.

Standing up, trying to keep his disappointment and the bitter irritation under it down, Zackel again perused the faded words on the wall. No epiphany came to him: the message remained a mystery. Much like the ogres had been…

"…unless…" Zackel said, recalling the creatures who lived here…and what they might have seen.

Zackel quickly realized it was a long shot: ogres were not all stupid, but there was a difference between not being stupid and not being stupid in a 'useful fashion' . Considering he didn't have anything else, Zackel went with it, leaving the hidden room and its enigma behind.

Zackel knocked loudly on the basement door before he opened it, slowly and carefully heading down the stairs, doing his best to make sure that he wasn't coming down in a threatening manner. The fact that he found all the ogres clustered up like when he'd initially found the hidden room as he reached the bottom of the stairs indicated he hadn't really succeeded.

Zackel put on his best calm, welcome expression (which was somewhat difficult with the basement's terrible smell) and put his staff aside, holding up his hands.

"Nothing…has…changed." Zackel said. "I just…want to ask…questions."

The ogres' own expressions didn't change, their eyes wary and mildly hostile. At least the females looked a bit more alert then two days ago: summoned mage food was hardly a feast, but it was worlds better then cannibalism when it came to basic nutrition.

"No matter…what answer…you give…nothing change." Zackel said. "No right…or wrong answer. Just…want to know."

The ogres remained silent.

"…You…live here…have you…seen…anything…strange…here?"

The ogres glanced at each other before looking back at the mage.

"By…strange…I mean….scary. Not normal. Anything. Anything at all."

"…we…no." One of the females finally said. "Live…good. Just…bad creatures…want harm us…that only not normal thing."

Zackel struggled not to frown, worried the ogres would misinterpret it.

"The…bad creatures. Humans?"

"Humans. Orcs. Walking dead." The ogre female said. Zackel was confused for a moment, before he recalled that the Forsaken had sent various Horde agents up into the area, for some reason Zackel couldn't recall. The humans must have been the nearby Syndicate.

"…did…you…take anything from them? Anything…strange?"

"…Men take. Food, weapons, armor…strongest get. Not see much." The ogre female said. Zackel considered pressing the issue, and then realized that by the nature of what the female had said, anything the ogres may have had that was unusual would have been on their person when Zackel's storm consumed them.

"…the men…in here." Zackel said. "Anything…strange…they have?"

"…no." The ogre female said. Zackel decided to drop the issue there. It would be cruel otherwise.

"…the boy. One who…looked around castle." Zackel said. After a few moments, the ogre child stepped forward, hard to tell apart from his peers when they were all bunched up. Zackel noted that he was no longer wearing the bandage and bore no evidence of a wound, which gave him a mild sense of satisfaction. "Boy…did you…know my traps?"

The child ogre stared for a second, dull confusion on its face.

"Traps…of ice. Put up…thought you were…danger…because of how…you hide." Zackel said. "How did you…miss traps?"

"…I see." The ogre child said. "Watch you…go under."

"…Go under…traps? How you know…to go under?"

"…I see…you…and trap…and go under." The child said. Zackel turned his gaze away from the young ogre, pondering just what he meant. He didn't think the child was repeating himself, ergo…had he been watching, and seen the trap activate when Zackel been testing them during his initial deployment? And by sheer luck managed to figure out a way to avoid them?

"…boy…are there other passages…in castle? You use?"

"No! I stay down here! Like say…!" The ogre child said, panic entering his tone.

"No, no. I mean…before. Before I find you."

"Oh…yes. Some. Use all. Want…show?"

"…no. That's…not…needed." Zackel said, picking up his staff. Knowing the routes wouldn't really help him: if something strange was in them, Zackel was sure they would have mentioned it based on how he'd stressed what he was looking for. The long shot had missed, and he didn't know what else to do or where else to go. "Thank you…"

Zackel made some more food and water for the ogres before he went back up the stairs, wanting to drive home that their inability to help him would not be held against them. He locked the door before leaning on it with his forehead, closing his eyes.

The hidden room did not give a clear X-factor. The ogres' minimal knowledge did not offer one either. Zackel's own analysis had also failed to turn one up.

Which left one option.

"…well then." Zackel said. "I guess it's back into the fire with a side order of the frying pan."

* * *

It didn't matter what Zackel did.

The small, irrational fear had clawed its way up into Rielle's gut over who knew how long she'd been sitting by the fire, and now perched on her mind like one of the Lich King's malevolent gargoyles. The concept that whatever role the mage had had in trapping her here, he no longer had any sway in how it would end.

He hadn't just created an out of control storm. His inexperience in using arcane magic to manipulate weather had created something WORSE, some sort of sadistic, squatting force that reveled in hammering away at this broken-down citadel and its unfortunate occupants. And while it might eventually show pity on the mage after he had groveled and humiliated himself in front of it enough, Rielle knew it would never show anything to her but a desire for her death. She'd defied it, and now it was letting her know that the price for her defiance would be a long, slow end. Nothing glorious, nothing worthy, nothing her parents could smile through their tears with. She might never be found at all, lost in one of the forgotten corners of this world…

Except that was all nonsense, wasn't it?

The storm didn't have a mind, just like the castle didn't have ghosts. Just ogres and misunderstandings. This was the latter. Her anger and her situation and all the other stuff had wound up inside her in a great big toxic mix, and the only reason she hadn't dealt with it yet was because it had become a giant, festering wart and the only solution was to lance it. She was a warrior. She had been taught that there were times to avoid pain and times to embrace it to serve a greater purpose. If she could endure having a tooth pulled without any type of pain relief and having an emergency battlefield cauterization on her leg to stop an arterial leg wound, she could…

No. That was what they wanted her to think. They knew the only way to get around her guard was to make her think she would be foolish to keep it up. Just like with Sparse, and Wirekoth, and Niraband. She'd tried to be reasonable and not suspect all mages, and they'd ended up conspiring against her in the end. This wasn't a matter of swallowing her pride, this was a matter of going with her gut, even as twisted as it seemed at the time. She'd always had to rely on it in the end anyway: everything else let her down. Her allies for not seeing the problem, her people and their damn whispers and judgments…

_Just like Zackel's, no matter the source…_

And of course, the mage. Who'd trapped them here. Who had made her feel like this. Who was forcing her to remember things.

She would find her own solution. She always had before. She was strong. She was powerful. She didn't need to admit flaws that weren't there…

She was always alone in the end…

* * *

Zackel stopped in front of the door.

"…okay then." Zackel said, reaching out to knock.

He stopped two thirds of the way there. He wasn't (too) ashamed to admit it was because of fear. Not fear for his life (though there was a touch of that), but fear of all that could go wrong if Zackel went through the door. And how much of it could be nothing more than what lay within himself and Rielle.

But he was in the right. He just wanted to do the right thing. Why keep torturing himself…

Then again…

Zackel withdrew his hand, placing it against his chin and pondering his options. Was he down to making excuses? Or was there some vital, esoteric thought nagging in the back of his head that would be completely lost if he went into the room?

It had been two days. Maybe Rielle had calmed down by now. Maybe she would be more willing to be sensible. Or maybe he should cut off her bullshit before she completely convinced herself of its righteousness…

…Or maybe it wasn't time for that yet.

"…DAMN IT." Zackel said, turning around. He walked a few more steps before he whirled back around and approached the door. He stopped short again, and after a few seconds started pounding on the side of his head.

"WHY-DO-THE-WOMEN-IN-MY-LIFE-ALWAYS-END-UP-SO-COMPLICATED?" Zackel said to himself, punctuating each word with a blow to his own skull. "All right Zackel…what is this…is this fools rush in where Naaru fear to tread, or he who hesitates is lost?…And why are you debating the issue so much?"

Zackel stared at the door, but like many other things in the fortress, it refused to provide him answers. Finally, he put his ear to the door. A few adjustments allowed him to hear breathing inside.

Zackel closed his eyes, debating for another dozen seconds before he sighed deeply.

"You're a coward, mage. Or brilliant. Watch, it will be the former." Zackel said, as he turned towards the stairs. He'd decided to give it one more night. One more night of thought. If he woke up tomorrow, and nothing had changed, then the first thing he was going to do was march into the room and deal with whatever the consequences were.

One more night to figure this out.

Figure her out.

Figure himself out.

* * *

No way out.

No escape from it. Not in any way she could muster. Rielle had thought she'd heard someone at the door, but nothing had come of it. She was alone.

Which is what she wanted.

Which was what she hated.

Which was what she was used to.

Which is what she expected of her life.

Which made the quiet so…quiet.

"…I guess I'm just a disappointment again, aren't I." Rielle said to the fire. As she spoke, her decision settled on her, and she stood up. "Well, _weerku_ you. I might as well be a full-on failure. It's what you all decided I would be, after all!"

It didn't take Rielle long, pawing through the mage's things, before she located the chemical vials he'd used to prepare his PT alcohol. She did vaguely remember that he'd done some measurements in adding them to water.

Rielle didn't bother, dumping both of the entire vials into her water canteen, shaking it up, and throwing the resulting mix down the hatch.

Whatever went into her stomach couldn't feel any worse then what was already in it.

* * *

Sleep was slow in coming to Zackel.

What was worse that his mind kept wandering away from the problem at hand and returning to the fonder memories he had of Rielle. At first, Zackel had hoped that he was searching for fresh insight, but as time passed and his mental facilities began to fog over with his approaching sleep, the mage began to realize that he might have just been remembering some good times before they all ended, or punishing himself for what might have been.

Why he felt the need to punish himself, Zackel didn't know. Sleep claimed him before he found an answer.

Sleep…

Sleep was a troublesome process as an adventurer in Azeroth. Despite measures and spells that could bring you back to a safe place, not every person who set out to quest around the world and beyond made use, or had access, to them. And if you found yourself needing to sleep in a hostile area, you either quickly learned to get by on little until you were safe, or learned to sleep deep enough to rest and light enough to be aware of danger. If you didn't, then chances are a deeper sleep would find you, one that you never woke up from.

Zackel had thought he had learned enough about such ways.

When the hand seized on his throat, he only learned that he was wrong.

"Wh-!" Zackel gagged, his eyes shooting open even as his hand clawed for his staff. The knee that planted itself on his arm stopped that cold, even as the equally cold point of the knife shoved itself under his chin.

"Thiissss is ending, maggeeee." Rielle slurred, her glowing eyes locking onto Zackel's even as Zackel's vision cleared.

"Rie-?"

"Noooooo tallkkking…" Rielle said. "Always…talking. Tired…"

Rielle's breath wafted down to Zackel's nostrils, the reek of alcohol so strong it managed to shock the mage all over again. His PT mix. Rielle must have gotten into it. But why…?

Why didn't really matter. She had, and was clearly drunk, at least. Worse, the truth she had supposedly found in the drink clearly was going to hurt, and hurt HIM at that.

"Why did you do it? Do you mages think it's funny? Or are all your staffs and explosions just a great big bunch of compensation…for small things?" Rielle said.

"Rielle, you need to…"

"I'M DOING WHAT _I _NEED." Rielle said, tightening her grip. "Should have done it when I first had my hands on you. Before you could talk with your little storm. Feed its ego. Make it mean and hateful. Make it DEFY you. Well, if you can't talk it down…then maybe there are other ways to bring it down."

"…Rielle…what are you doing?" Zackel said, his voice equal parts scared out of his wits and trying to collect them. He was going to need them, or the worst possibilities he had imagined were going to seem positively grand as end results.

"I'm doing what I WANT! And I want OUT." Rielle said. "And if the only way out is to TAKE you OUT…!

Zackel felt the dagger point bite deeper into his flesh.

"Then…I'm prepared to make that sacrifice."


	22. Why We Fight: Strychnine Lives

Chapter 22: Strychnine Lives

They said that those who did not learn from the past were doomed to repeat it. After Jasciona and Daldion, and all the pain that his failures with them had caused him, Zackel had done his best to follow that creed.

And despite that, here he was again, looking into the eyes of a close female friend and finding that what he'd known was gone. All that was left was seething, destructive antipathy, both in her eyes and in the curl of her mouth…

Except, from that same mouth, the stink of alcohol kept drifting down. Despite the danger of his situation, that fact, and its stench, kept coming to the forefront of Zackel's mind.

"Except, I bet, that won't help at all." Rielle said. "The storm doesn't respect you or obey you, what would killing you do? It would probably celebrate its freedom by tearing this whole place down brick by brick. Fel, maybe I'm just killing myself…but in all honesty, maybe I'll do it anyway. Just so it knows that while it got me, I didn't go willingly or quietly."

"Rielle…" Zackel tried to say.

"No, NO. NO TALKING. You'll just try and distract me…stupid mage. I'm on to you. If I even BEGIN to feel the temperature in this room drop any more, this blade goes right up through your silver tongue and ends in your oh-so-vaunted brain." Rielle said. "Maybe I should do it anyway, before you delude yourself into trying to play the hard-done-by-and-learned saint again. Oh boohoohoo, my girlfriend dumped my ass and my brother was too stupid to give up on me and ended up a victim of coincidence because of it. I'll make sure I become enlightened and kind because of it, and help all who cross my path! You know what you remind me of, mage? You remind me of the myth of my people. And that's what it is. A MYTH."

With those last two words, Rielle's eyes changed. The anger briefly left, revealing something else. Something that reached into Zackel's mind and brought the rest of his alarm down under control.

He knew what he had to do, even as half his mind screamed at him not to do it. Screamed to him that the bloom was long off the rose and the only way to stop the encroaching weeds was to yank them up by the roots…

Zackel forced that part down, one last time. If anything happened now, he would know it was truly due to it being his sole measure.

"Oh look, he's LISTENING! Why should I be surprised? You've been a limp noodle from the moment we met!" Rielle said. "Cowardly, craven MAGE, hiding behind lies and trickery and, and, pretending to be so PATHETIC…which makes you JUST AS PATHETIC…!"

"…out…"

"What?"

"Can…get you out…"

"…What?" Rielle said, true confusion briefly crossing her features. Zackel seized on it before Rielle jumped to a false conclusion, like he had purposely been holding her there for some nefarious purpose. The end of _that _possible line of thought was likely his own.

"…go…into storm…together…" Zackel rasped. "Transfer…my specialized talent…to you…might not…work…might get…lost…but let you…get much further…than you normally would…"

"What? Transfer your talent? You mean…whatever kept you alive in that storm up on the roof? But….why didn't you…?"

"Easy…to do…when still. Moving…much harder. And…could only take myself." Zackel said. "But…if escape you…need so much…will try and transfer…will take the risk…"

Zackel knew his gamble hadn't paid off when he felt Rielle's hand grip his throat even tighter, completely cutting off his air.

"No! NONONONO!" Rielle yelled, her eyes flaring with new rage. "STOP IT! Stop being so PLACATING, so thrice-damned PASSIVE! It makes me SICK! I have you by the throat, by the BALLS…and what do you do? You continue to try and mollify me! THAT'S NOT THE WAY LIFE WORKS! ACT NORMAL, DAMN YOU! CURSE ME! THREATEN ME! TELL ME WHAT YOU REALLY THINK! WHAT YOU REALLY FEEL!"

Rielle relaxed her grip, and Zackel pulled precious air into his lungs, which brought a fresh jab of pain under his jaw. The point of the knife was still there, and Rielle's intense fury hadn't faded an iota…

This time, there was no flashback. Zackel did not see Zuijizra's merrily violent face, or hear her sadistic laugh. All he saw was the rage of the draenei above him…and all the seething dark behind it. Her stone mask was slipping off.

"DO IT! DAMN YOU, DO IT!" Rielle snarled. "STOP ACTING LIKE YOU'RE SOMETHING MORE THAN YOU REALLY ARE, OR I SWEAR TO THE NETHER…!"

One last push.

"…Don't like this." Zackel said.

"Don't like WHAT? HOW I'M ACTING? TOO BAD!" Rielle yelled, drawing her face down and looking directly into Zackel's eyes. "WHY DON'T YOU DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!"

"…Don't…like…being like you."

Zackel heard an audible grinding creak as Rielle's jaw tightened, her breathing speeding up as fresh rage blasted through her veins…

Even as the blood from Zackel's own finally finished its trip down her blade. Lacking a handle, nothing stopped it from touching Rielle's hand.

As cold as the room had made her hand, and despite how hot the circumstances had made her rage, she still felt it.

Zackel saw the realization wash over her features, though he didn't know the immediate source. He'd been trying for a different reaction, one that involved her removing her blade to do a more dramatic downward stab in anger rather then the swift, murderous thrust that would kill him and damn her. Zackel had hoped and prayed that had it worked, she would have realized her actions and re-directed the stab. If she didn't…he would have dealt with it accordingly. Perhaps even come out of it alive.

But said circumstances never triggered, Rielle pushing herself away and withdrawing the knife from his body, though she kept her hand on his throat. Zackel looked at her stare at the blade, and fortunately for him, was able to swiftly figure out the reason why. He, even more swiftly, decided that what had happened was probably even better, and ran with it.

"But this isn't you, is it Rielle?" Zackel said. "No flattery or trickery to save my life can alter that essential truth. This is not you. If it was, you never would have noticed that."

"Shut up…" Rielle said.

"Rielle, listen to me. If you grant me a last request, then just listen to me. I mean it. If staying here is driving you so mad…then I'll take you out. I'll transfer my ability to endure cold to you. It won't be perfect, we'll move slow, and the odds of both of us making it are slim…but I'll do it. Maybe there are those who should suffer like this, but you're not one of them."

"You don't know me, just stop…stop talking…!" Rielle said, tightening her grip on Zackel's throat once more.

"Rielle…if this is what you want, I can't stop you." Zackel said. There was more truth in that than Zackel would have liked to admit, but this circumstance would not be solved by more lies. "But if this IS what you want…then the only one you'll have to answer to in the end, is yourself. If you really believe that's the only one in this world you can ever speak to…the only one you'd ever want to…the only one you'll ever have…then do it. If this is who you are, in the end…then do what you will."

Rielle turned her gaze back towards Zackel, her face a storm of emotions.

"Because…if that's who you really are…then there's nothing I can do, or any prison I could keep you in, that matches the abyss of your own self. And if that's what you are in truth…then that is what you truly _deserve."_

The storm abruptly cleared, but for the wrong reasons, as all ambiguity on Rielle's features were replaced once again by the terrible rage.

"_**Deserves?"**_ Rielle said, and terror filled Zackel's heart. He'd screwed up.

Worse, he'd been banking so hard on not doing so that he hadn't properly prepared a defense.

That is, nothing that could stop her as Rielle turned the knife over in her hand, raised it with a vicious yank, and brought it down.

* * *

In the manner of shock, it took Zackel several seconds before he realized he wasn't dead.

It took him another few seconds to open his tightly clenched eyes and turn his head back towards Rielle, having instinctively recoiled and cringed away from the descending blade when Rielle had been bringing it down towards his face. Said point was no longer aimed at him; Rielle was again holding the dagger up and staring at it.

With the motion of Zackel returning his gaze to the alien, Rielle did so in turn. The anger was gone from her features, replaced with only a dull confusion.

And as the two looked at each other, the ashen visage of the Draenei began to be stolen over by an expression of sick realization. She turned her eyes back to the dagger, even as she released her grip on Zackel's throat. A moment later her body left Zackel's, Rielle standing up even as she looked at the knife. At the blood on it.

For one brief, horrifying second, Zackel could have sworn she was going to ram it into her own face.

Instead she dropped it, the knife clattering to the ground as Rielle turned and lurched off, saying nothing and making only the faintest keening noise beneath her breath. Zackel watched her disappear out the door. The several seconds of silence that followed allowed to re-gather his mind.

That had been far too close. He'd almost out-thought himself, and in trying to make Rielle realize what he perceived as her error, he'd angered her so much by its occurrence that she'd nearly lashed out blind. Worse, he'd jumped onto the 'blood sensation realization' so firmly he'd forgotten to keep up his backup plan from his original plan going (that being ice armor on his face to stop or re-direct the blade). Had she not stopped herself, Zackel had a sinking sensation that he would have been dead, or at least, severely inconvenienced.

Or maybe he'd just been stupid to try it, based on the fact that she was drunk…

That possibility quickly raised a larger spectre over Zackel's mind, and he stopped getting up in mid-lift, plopping back down on the ground while he dug back into his immediate memory. With all that had happened, Rielle's intensely alcohol-heavy breath had been a tertiary concern, but something in it had clearly been there, something that had stopped him just now. Zackel sat for a brief period of time, doing his best to remember the smell and trying to analyze it…

"…shit." Zackel said. It was hard to classify just what he'd thought he'd detected in the smell, a hardly there undertone, and he was no druid or hunter, who often developed senses of smell so keen they could sometimes out-pace hunting dogs. But whatever it was, it bothered him. Whatever it was, it gave him a tangible sense of _bad._

The PT mix had been thrown together, experimental. In his hands, with his practiced alchemical skills handing out the doses, likely nothing bad could have occurred. But the concoction had left his hands, and whether that was by any fault of his own didn't matter. What mattered were the possibilities of the alarming suggestion that the smell was setting off in the back corners of his mind, an unknown problem that refused to solidify but remained in itself a problem. Several possible hypotheses leapt to Zackel's mind, each worse than the last, and though Zackel knew that he tended towards over-reacting at times, he also knew that in this case, over-reacting might get the best result.

"…_SHIT."_ Zackel said, scrambling up. He almost forgot to grab his staff, as he hurried out into the hallway.

The brief passage through said hallways closed onto Zackel with an ominous dread that somehow even surpassed the mage's previous experiences heading through them. One would think an unknown threat would convey more menace than an intoxicated alien, but Zackel didn't feel that way. Not knowing where Rielle was, or just what the PT mix was doing to her, make the hallways seem infinitely more suffocating and dangerous than all his ghost hunts. Heading up the stairs, having not encountered anyone in the halls, wasn't much better.

The door to the pair's former safe house turned Rielle's isolation chamber was open. For one brief but paralyzing moment, Zackel suddenly had a terrible inclination that what he would encounter inside was not Rielle, but a scene of destruction, all his alchemical materials smashed in a fit of petty temper, cutting off any assistance he could give the beleaguered alien…

_And well then, that would just seal the fate she made for herself, wouldn't it? Might even make you realize that all you do is give, and all she does is take!_

"Yeah maybe you're right I don't care." Zackel said, shoving the voice down and going into the room. Relief surged through him as he saw his still-on-the-table items, moved around a bit, but intact and un-smashed. Zackel leaned his staff against the wall and looked down at his tricks of the trade, tapping a finger as he began pondering.

"Okay based on my previous mix…what I have…and basic possibilities…yeah, seems best." Zackel said, snatching up one of his remaining empty vials. To it he added some of his remaining healing elixir, carefully putting the medicinal tincture aside afterwards. Healing potions were great for physical injuries, but Rielle's problem required a more specific tact.

One she was likely going to kill him for, as Zackel sprinkled a blue powder into the healing potion and corked it up to shake the mix. Opening it and taking a sniff, Zackel carefully dripped three drops of one of his other liquids into the shifting tonic, one drop of another, and after another shake and smell test, a touch more of a second powder. Holding the mix up in front of him, Zackel watched its color cycle from purple to a murky green, and gave it one last smell-check once it had.

Complete. Now all he had to do was find Rielle…

Which did not take long, as Zackel turned around and found her directly behind him.

How the fel she'd moved so quietly, Zackel didn't know.

How she'd done it while picking up her axe, the mage was also clueless about. The shock of seeing her almost caused Zackel to drop his creation.

"What are you doinnggg…!" Rielle said, the words spilling from her mouth like prickled burs. The alcohol expulsion wafted to Zackel's nose anew…

Still there. It was still there.

So Zackel acted, holding up his hands and drawing Rielle's attention to them.

Even as he materialized a length of ice directly through Rielle's hair. Rielle's eyes widened at the sudden cold, which gave Zackel the split-seconds he needed to make the length of ice twist 180 degrees and both tangle up Rielle's hair and yank it backwards from her scalp.

"Ah…!" Rielle said, opening her mouth

Zackel shoved his vial into it, grabbing Rielle's jaw and slamming it shut before she could react. Had the draenei been sober, Zackel knew he never would have been able to do what he'd done.

Nor what he did to follow up, as he spun around Rielle and smacked her on the back as hard as he could. Rielle convulsed from the strike, muscles contracting by instinct and causing a follow up reaction, namely making her swallow the foul-tasting mix Zackel had dumped in her mouth.

"Rielle listen to…!"

The backhand should have broken his jaw and knocked him out, had it not struck the ice armor Zackel immediately manifested before impact. He hated being fooled twice, especially if he was fooling himself. He still didn't much care for the pain of the blow, nor for the way it knocked him sprawling onto the ground.

"WHAT DID YOU DO!" Rielle screamed, whirling around as the vial flew from her mouth.

"Rielle it wasn't poison LISTEN TO…!"

The axe buried itself in the ground where Zackel had just been, the mage barely managing to roll out of the way of the attack.

He was not so fortunate in avoiding the follow up strike, as Rielle yanked her axe up, moved forward, and lashed out with her foot in a smooth combination move that verged on sublime, especially considering her less than optimal state. Zackel did not really appreciate the artistry of the move, as the ice armor on his ribs only barely saved him from several broken bones and did not save him from being tossed through the air and violently smashed into the wall. The impact against the stone floor wasn't much fun either, and Zackel tried to get past the interesting colors dancing in his vision and regain his feet.

Rielle's shadow loomed over him, and he knew he didn't even have time for that.

"Not poison! Not poison!" Zackel said.

"_Weerkuay_ lying _MAGE, _no more…" Rielle hissed, bringing both hands to her axe. "SEND YOU TO…TO…"

Rielle stopped, her hands relaxing on her weapon, confusion running across her features. Zackel shook his head and watched, even as Rielle put one hand on her stomach.

"What…?" Rielle said, before she violently convulsed. "No…no mage what did you do…what did you…!"

Rielle dropped her axe as she began staggering away. Zackel moved quicker, scrambling over to where the several buckets the pair had used sat in the corner, grabbing one up.

"Ahhhh…!" Rielle said, even as Zackel shoved the bucket into her hands.

"I'm sorry." Zackel said, and looked away.

Zackel doubted the alien noticed, as she proceeding to be violently and very noisily sick into the bucket, all thoughts of battle briefly forgotten as she emptied her stomach contents into her provided container. Zackel waited until the retches turned into more normal groans, even as he leaned over and grabbed another bucket.

"You bastard…!" Rielle said, sluggishly shoving the full bucket away. "What the fel…oh no…!"

Zackel handed over the other bucket in time for Rielle to be sick again. By the time she was done, she seemed to have even thrown up the anger that made her toss insults Zackel's way, as she collapsed on her side, breathing heavily.

"I'm sorry Rielle. I really am." Zackel said, crouching down near the alien again, who stared at him with baleful weariness. "My makeshift alcohol was poisoning you. I could smell it on your breath."

"What…how did…?" Rielle said, before her gut churned again. Zackel managed to grab another bucket, but Rielle did not vomit any more in the end, though she kept the bucket close.

"You must have drank it at too high a dosage. I don't know. I didn't have time to figure out specifics." Zackel said. "I had to whip up a purging tonic. And I didn't have time to convince you to drink it. I'm sorry for what I did do…but I had to act. I didn't want you to die. Or worse."

"…_worse?_" Rielle said, the rage creeping back into her voice. "I'll show you _WORSE_…!"

The loud gurgling noise that came from Rielle's stomach was heard even over her elevated voice, and she looked down at herself, glancing at the bucket and then at Zackel, confusion again in her eyes.

"Like I said. Purging tonic. I needed to get as much out as possible." Zackel said. "…I really AM sorry."

"Oh you…bastardddddd…!" Rielle yelled, getting up and fleeing towards the lavatory. Zackel watched her go.

"…yes, definitely a good thing we made the effort to clean that place up." Zackel said, and went looking for proper sanitary materials. He'd leave some outside the door in a bit. Just in case.

* * *

If looks could kill, Zackel probably would have been dead long ago, but the Draenei herself had proven far too worn out after her thoroughly unpleasant disemboguing to do much else when she'd returned to the room, staggering over and kneeling by the fire.

"Are you all right?" Zackel had asked. Rielle's response was a wordless gesture. Zackel accepted it, noting that she didn't seem like she planned to move before he returned to his work on his second alchemical mix. Rielle had watched the whole time, glaring all the while, until Zackel had gotten up and walked towards her.

"Drink this." Zackel said, offering Rielle the vial. Rielle stared at it, and then at the mage like he'd suddenly grown a second head and started tap dancing.

"Are you _weerkuay CRAZY?_ After what you did with the…!"

"You. Were. POISONED." Zackel said firmly. "You lost a lot of water just now, Rielle. I don't want you to get dehydrated. This will help replace the basic nutrients you just lost. No more unpleasantness. It even tastes decent."

"Screw you." Rielle said, crossing her arms.

"Rielle, you're a lot of things. Not all of them good. But I know you're not petulant." Zackel said, kneeling down. "Okay, maybe after that excessively not-fun experience, you're not exactly trusting. Fine." Zackel said, putting the vial to his lips and drinking a small amount of it. Rielle watched with wearisome acrimony, and after two minutes of silence and Zackel not initiating his own 'purging', she snatched it from his hands and downed it with one shot.

"…water please." Rielle said. Zackel handed her a canister, which she promptly emptied.

Then she punched Zackel in the face.

Zackel, to his mild surprise, saw it coming. To a smaller and more angry surprise, he let her hit him.

Her blow lacked a considerable amount of the strength the draenei had, but it still hurt. Zackel turned back from the small recoil he'd done from the blow, holding his face and regarding the alien with his own rankled expression.

"…feel better?"

"…no." Rielle said quietly, her arm dropping to her side. "Not really…no."

Zackel blinked. For the first time, shame had come across the alien's features. She'd been stripped of dignity and her sense of righteousness, and it had dawned on her that most of it had been her own doing. Zackel allowed himself a moment, a brief moment, to feel satisfaction at this fact.

Satisfaction that quickly morphed into disgust at himself for feeling it. Zackel closed his eyes and shoved the petty feelings down. They'd deserved a small reward, but it couldn't last long. The questions that remained would not be answered by it.

"Rielle, what happened?" Zackel said. "Did you miscalculate the dosage…?"

"Oh stop asking questions you already know the answer to, _mage._" Rielle said, her features growing hard again. "No. I tried to drink it all and oh look I poisoned myself. What would have happened, would I have exploded?"  
"…uh…I'm really not sure…" Zackel said, thrown off-track a bit despite himself. "I could smell something…_off_ about your breath, under the alcohol…I couldn't tell what it was, just that it was some unnatural chemical reaction. It could have done…all sorts of things. Eaten a hole in your stomach, make your digestive fluids start gelling and blocked up your system, killed your liver…I really couldn't say. I just knew it was bad."

"Oh yay, so the brilliant and abused mage rose above his small-minded companion and saved her life, and got to do it in a way so she was completely stripped of pride and hauteur. Are you proud of yourself, Zackel? Oh wait no, it would be too SMALL and BELOW YOU to be like that. You have to be so pious you make the members of the Holy Light turn green with envy. Whoopee! Bravo! Why cannot I recognize the privilege of being in your presence?" Rielle said bitterly.

"…I don't know about that, Rielle." Zackel said. "I do know I'm glad I saved your life. And I'm worried that I had to."

Rielle stared at the mage for a few more seconds, and then looked away, her expression turning penitent once more.

"…why do you _care…?_" Rielle said quietly. "I've treated you like shit, I've threatened you, I just tried to kill you twice…"

"Yeah. You did. And I _don't _appreciate that." Zackel said. "But I'm not going to rush to condemn you, Rielle. Not out of any divine understanding. My basic understanding is good enough, I think. And I know that whatever our differences, you're not stupid enough to accidentally poison yourself. If you're going and doing that…"

Rielle said nothing, her gaze still turned away.

"…Rielle. We have our disagreements. Maybe they're too big to overcome, I don't know…" Zackel said. "But before it all went wrong, I considered you a friend. Is that completely gone? Are we really too different?"

Rielle remained silent.

"…I can't speak for you." Zackel said. "But…part of where it blew up was the misunderstanding of my flashbacks. You thought I was disgusted for your opinions about the Horde, when I was just remembering my own failings. Rielle…you made me talk about that. And it HELPED."

While Rielle remained quiet, Zackel thought, and hoped, that he saw the slightest adjustment in her gaze towards him.

"That part of my life…it was choking me, Rielle. Weighing me down. I wasn't paying penance, I was idiotically and selfishly indulging in self-pity and hatred. If you hadn't dragged it out…it probably would have eaten me alive." Zackel said. "Like I said, I can't speak for you. But it helped me, Rielle. Maybe it will help you. Whatever it is, however you want…let it out."

"…you're so sure you think you have me figured out." Rielle said.

"Sure? Fel no. I don't know if I have myself figured out." Zackel said. "I'm just offering my opinion based on my observations. If you have no use for it, again…well, that's that."

"…yeah. Isn't it always that way. That being that." Rielle said. "So sorry, mage. I don't have some great, terrible failing, some lost love or wounded soul mate in my past, no error that caused pain and death, no disaster of my own making. I just have myself."

Zackel cocked his head, uncertain which way the conversation was going.

"…and that's really enough of a failing as is, it seems." Rielle said.

Silence covered the room. After a few moments, Rielle finally looked up at Zackel again.

"What? No protestations that I'm not a failure? No sneaky trick lines to try and get me to spill my guts?"

"…well, I will admit, I was considering the former." Zackel said. "But you spoke before I could decide on it."

"You don't think I'm a failure. Yeah…sure. You'd know." Rielle said. "What do you know about my kind?"

"The Draenei?…Just what we've discussed over our time here. What I know and what you told me. I haven't learned anything since then."

"The people of this world…so many of them think we're so holy. So blessed." Rielle said. "They really don't understand why. It's not because we're inherently pure and special…not all of us anyway. It's how we cope. Cope with all that's happened ever since Sargeras came and sent us into exile. Cope with all that's come since…and what's come onto us."

Rielle sighed deeply, rubbing at her eyes.

"Tell me, Zackel, how old do you think I am?"

"…well…I recall that your species is very long lived, and moreso with the Naaru's aid, so…around two hundred years old?" Zackel said.

"A nice attempt. Try six hundred." Rielle said. "When I was born, my people had been fleeing the Legion for thousands of years. My parents and my older brother had been on Argus when my kind left it. Though they are not as old as Velen…the Dimensional Ship _Oshu'gun _contained special chambers that let us sleep for long periods of time, and prevented us from aging entirely while we slept. Valen was one of the few who did not enter them, as he needed to lead my people…even so, when I was born, Argus was a distant memory for many of us. Even my brother, who was a child when he left, barely remembered it. During the several centuries I spent on the ship, before we found Draenor…I found I didn't really understand our situation. I was told about the man'ari and their fall, and why we drifted through the Great Dark Beyond because of it…but it was so long ago. I had not been around for our other efforts to find a home, the close calls we had with the Legion…and I didn't really understand the hardship of it all. When we found Draenor, and settled there, thinking we were free…it seemed to drift even further away. Until the orcs were corrupted. Until the Legion set them loose on us."

Rielle stopped, looking away from Zackel as the shadow of the memories came across her. Zackel had to resist taking her hand: he had a feeling she would resent it.

"I know that your country, your world, has also suffered from the horrors of the Legion. I can't, and don't, claim what we suffered is worse…but I believe that it resonated more deeply with my kind. You were attacked by an unknown enemy, and that is hard to endure…but we were attacked by an enemy we thought we had finally escaped. An enemy that did not even do us the justice of facing us head on. Instead they went to the orcs, poisoned them with their evil, and then set their new slaves against us. The orcs took everything from us, everything…" Rielle said, black hate spiking through her voice again. Zackel felt cold apprehension creep through his veins for a few seconds, before the soft pain of recalled memories re-asserted itself on Rielle's features. "Because of us. Our presence damned them, and damned us in turn. So much death…so much loss. So many widows…orphans…so many grieving parents."

Zackel opened his mouth to speak, and then closed it again. There were no proper words, not yet, not even for someone like him.

"That was the thing, Zackel. After all we had endured, my kind needed anything it could find to hold onto. The Naaru, our great protectors…even they could not fully protect us from this. They alone could not comfort us. We needed other things, anything that we could find…and one of the things chosen was the few, fortunate families who had not lost any of their members to the orcs' assault. Any family that remained intact was looked upon as blessed and special, and with expectation to do great things. After all, why else had all their members survived, if not for a reason? Surely random chance could not be that kind. It had to mean something. In those dark years…my people needed it to mean something."

"Your family survived?"

"My parents. My brother. My sisters, older and younger. Somehow, we all survived." Rielle said. "My brother Wyphirian fought on the front lines of many battles. He survived them all. My sister Zasuura attended her own battles, her own war zones, using her healing abilities to save lives. There were ambushes, sneak assaults…she survived them. My father Irenus, like Velen, had the gift of the Sight, albeit to a smaller degree. He used it to save lives even if it put him at risk. His kindness was rewarded with survival. And while my mother and younger sister could not do anything at the time, save what they could…tragedy avoided them as well. We all survived, where so many others did not. And as my people hid away from their destroyers, they sought ways to avoid despair. One of them was the concept of unbroken families. Through no fault of my own…of anyone's own, really…my people looked to me to be something exceptional."

Rielle finally looked back at Zackel, and the mage could have sworn the glow in her eyes had dulled a bit.

"So many see us as something more than we are. My people do believe in doing good, even I do…but not just because that is what is right. For many, it's the only consolation we have for what we've endured. Leaving Argus. What the man'ari became and the atrocities they've committed. Draenor and its loss. By trying to do good…we assure that it wasn't all for nothing. That the blessings of the Naaru were deserved and un-wasted. Because of that…many don't think my people have their own flaws. Sometimes I fear…that many of my people believe that as well. And when they do…"

Rielle broke her line of sight again as she slowly shook her head.

"We did what we could to prepare, before the Naaru brought Tempest Keep, and the blood elves who had come to Draenor set in motion the events that brought the Exodar to your world. To survive and make ready for the day when we would strike back at the orcs and the Legion. Every Draenei wanted to bring something special to that effort…but for some, it wasn't hoped for. It was expected. We had to succeed, to be something…supposedly for the sake of us all." Rielle said. "My brother had no problem. He had become a mighty warrior long before the orcs came, a shining blade of the Light. My sister had also heard the call of the Light, learned to let it flow through her and heal the hurt and the dying. I knew what my people wanted of me, even though I didn't understand it. I tried to seek out what I thought would be my calling. To aid my brother, my sister…or maybe learn the power of magic, the same magic my species prized so deeply…"

Rielle fell silent for some time.

"It never came." The Draenei eventually said. "I wanted it to, I listened…and it never came. Instead of the Light or magic, I found I possessed a strength that exceeded some of the largest men of my species. I found that I could look at people, how their bodies moved, their faces, their eyes…and I could tell what they would do, what they were thinking. And…I found inside me burned a fire. A deep, raging fire, that could make me even stronger, make me ignore pain and weariness…and awake feelings in me that went against everything my species claimed was good. My people fought battles for righteousness, for duty, for others…I found that when I fought battles, I fought them not just for that, but for the joy it brought me. Overpowering my foes, grinding them beneath my heel, even cutting into their bodies and feeling their blood on me, hearing their dying screams…sometimes I couldn't ignore it. Sometimes it thrilled me. Sometimes…it brought me a pleasure that sometimes seemed greater than sex. I was expected to bring the battle to the monsters that opposed us…and instead, I found that there was a monster inside me. One that demanded to be fed."

Zackel felt his leg begin to cramp up from his position, but he dared not move it. He didn't want to risk anything interrupting Rielle's words. Much like his own experience, he had a feeling that saying this was, in its own way, even worse than living with it.

"I was not alone…there were others like me. But they were few in number…and none of them came from a 'blessed' family. And when I say like me…I don't know how much. I don't know if they felt the same savage joy I did when I brought my power to bear against my enemies…I don't know if I was even an abnormal among the abnormals." Rielle said. "At first I thought that it was a test. That if I learned to use this…rage…then it would lead me to something better. Something that fit more with what people wanted of me. In time…I realized that would not happen. The Light, magic…they would not come to me. All I had was the strength, and the rage. So…I embraced it. I made sure that I held full control over it. That I would never purposely seek out its dark pleasures. That it would become the blessing my teacher said it was…sometimes, I even delude myself into thinking I succeeded."

Rielle paused to look at the fire, which finally allowed Zackel to adjust his leg. If Rielle noticed, she gave no sign.

"I had one other hope during that time. My younger sister, Ishova, had also not found her calling. While she remained undecided, the question was placed that the concept of the blessed family was just that. That there was no set way for someone to become exceptional. As long as she was normal, I could hope that…they'd accept me. Until we took the Exodar and crashed on your world. Until we began to rebuild. Until my sister woke up one day and told us she could hear the wind speaking to her."

"…A shaman." Zackel said quietly.

"Some had awakened when Farseer Nobundo came among us. The greater life of Azeroth caused more to awaken to the power of the elements…and my sister was among them. And with that…my fate was sealed. My older siblings served the Light. My younger served the new, great power that had been brought to us by a Broken. My friends found the Light, or magic…while I…all I had was the rage. Everyone had looked to my family to see what we did with our blessing…and only one disappointed. Myself, and the monster inside me."

"…that's…" Zackel said.

"Stupid? Ridiculous? Wrong? Yeah. I know." Rielle said. "I spoke with the Naaru a time or two. They always told me that I _was _blessed. The strength of colossi and the same noble heart so many Draenei had. The worst part was…I could feel them inside me as they spoke. I knew that they were not offering me empty platitudes, that they understood my fear and my pain and tried to assuage it…but it didn't work. My family was the same way. My parents never changed how they treated me. Wyphirian and Zasuura welcomed me as their fellow and equal. Ishova admired me and sought to emulate me. And yet…it wasn't enough. Because the rest of my people, for their own sake, had wanted something else of me…and when I didn't live up to what they hoped, they felt betrayed."

Rielle slowly closed her eyes.

"…do you want to know the greatest curse of being seen as blessed, Zackel? Like so many see my people? As my people saw my family?" Rielle said. "It's never a blessing to the supposed blessed. You feel the need to live up to the concept…and you let it alter how you may naturally feel. My people likely knew, deep down, that how they felt about me was wrong…but the idea that they themselves had to be special and chosen got in the way of it. They couldn't accept their dark feelings, nor could they properly deal with them. But such feelings do not go away. They demand a release. So they looked to me instead, and laid the genesis of how they felt on me. I had failed to live up to their expectations. I was not like them. My strength, and what I offered my people, lay in destruction and ruin. Some wondered, too loudly, if I had been touched by the fel magic that had laid waste to Draenor, that it had tainted me…"

Rielle stopped. Zackel's eyes flicked downward, and noticed that Rielle's hands had become bunched into fists, her blue knuckles having nearly turned white.

"But that was nonsense, they soon said. All Draenei who had been corrupted by fel magic became Broken. I was still one of them. And even faced with that…they couldn't accept it." Rielle said. "Some said that perhaps I was a sign of fel's magic's truly insidious nature, changing me within without changing what lay without. And some said…that maybe there was nothing to taint. That the reason I was so unlike a Draenei was because I wasn't one. That, in some strange, throwback away…deep down, I was a Man'ari. Or the refuse of the kind of Eredar that had become the Man'ari. Not natural. Not acceptable. A failure."

Rielle opened her eyes, a dark fearsome intensity having come into the glowing orbs.

And even as Zackel looked into those eyes, the full impact of Rielle's words washed over him, clearing away the fog. A lot of things finally made sense.

"So I left. I set out across your world, and the remains of my own. I thought that once I was away from their gaze and judgments…maybe I'd find out why I became this. But I've found nothing. Nothing except what I know, and what others thought of it. And even with what the Naaru told me…with what my family, who never asked to be put on any pedestal, told me…even with all the times I told myself…how can I say they're wrong?" Rielle said. "Knowing what's inside me, who I am, what I love…what can I say is the real me? How can I claim otherwise…with what I remind you of?"

Zackel blinked. Until the last sentence, he'd had no idea what to say.

"…and that…as we said…as my people said…is that." Rielle said. "And that's all it ever will be…as terrible as that may be." Rielle said.

"…I suppose any protests wouldn't help." Zackel said. "Telling you that they were wrong, or that my flashbacks had nothing to do with you…but as you said. You've told yourself that many times. It hasn't helped. And stuck here with me…you're starting to fear that maybe they're not the ones who are wrong."

"I fear…nothing…" Rielle said, in a tone that indicated she didn't believe what she was saying. "I…

"Rielle, it's true that there are a lot of things you can never really know about a person. No matter who you are, what you are, how smart you are, what you've experienced…no matter what." Zackel said. "But I know one thing. You are NOT a man'ari."

"You would…" Rielle said, before Zackel snapped up his hand and cut her off.

"Let me tell you what a man'ari would have done in this situation. A man'ari would have offered nothing in her efforts to train. She would not have tried to improve her partner in those efforts, only herself. She would not have showed restraint: she would have fought with all her power and told her victim that it was his fault for not being strong enough to catch up. All her efforts would have been devoted to her own benefit. If that broke her partner, well, what does it matter? All that matters is what she wants."

"Have you suffered brain damage? Do you really think all those beatings I handed you…"

"You hurt me, yes. But never without reason. And never with cruelty. You talk about feeling joy and bliss through combat…if you felt that way with me, if you performed your training to get it, then you didn't need to maul and crush me to get it. Not only that, but you sought to have me learn something from your efforts. Efforts that were not wasted."

"Are you…"

"Let me tell you what else a man'ari would have done." Zackel said, cutting Rielle off once more. "A man'ari would not have wanted to escape. A man'ari would not have felt trapped. A man'ari would have rejoiced that it was locked up with something it could so eagerly and thoroughly victimize, something it could cow and abuse until the storm lost its power or until it grew bored. Fel, it probably would have wanted the storm to last as long as it could, so it could spend even more time going about its work. It would have seen the pain the subject had in its life, and exploited it to ensure that it would never fight back, never resist. It would have brooked no dissention, and would only have acted kind to set up further cruelty. To a man'ari, something like this would be a vacation. A paradise."

Rielle said nothing, staring at Zackel.

"A man'ari wouldn't be content with the crimes of others. It would convince its victim that it was guilty of those crimes by default. That by the actions of Sparse, I deserved the punishment a man'ari would have given me." Zackel said. "A man'ari would have mocked my losses, told me that they were all the fault of my own inherent weakness, and used it to inflict more pain on its victim. A man'ari would take everything that I found joy and happiness in, and twist it until they were forever out of reach. And then when all that was done…then the man'ari would REALLY begin to work. I may not know you, Rielle, or what your people supposedly saw in you. But I know what I saw in the eyes of that demon who nearly killed me and my brother. What I just said…that's what I saw. That's what a man'ari is. That is _NOT _what you are."

Zackel felt his words trailing off, not sure what else to say. He ran a hand through his blue hair, pondering his options, unsure if any of it was working.

"…Maybe you couldn't give your people what they wanted. But that was never your task. It was, as you said, their own." Zackel said. "But a man'ari…all they can do is take. They craft nothing. They create nothing. _THEY_ bring nothing but destruction and ruin. Not you. A man'ari would have broken me. You…you helped fix me."

"…heh." Rielle said, a soft bitterness in her voice. Beyond it, Zackel swore he heard the faintest echo of a sob. "What a nice little speech. You spend our time apart thinking it up?"

"I suppose it makes sense that one little spiel from me wouldn't wipe away all your pain." Zackel said. "So I'll just say this. You asked me before why I cared. What you told me is the answer. I sensed it, I guess…and now I know. I care because we're so very much the same."

"You're pulling that old cliché?" Rielle said, but her tone was not dismissive.

"We both sought to be the best we could be. We both suffered from the decisions of others through no fault of our own. We both tried to bury it beneath a constant drive to move forward, thinking we could get away. And here, where neither of us could move any more…we both felt its weight upon us." Zackel said. "For me, it came through enduring your abuse without complaint and being reminded of my sins through your visage. For you, well…the past few days seems like a good indication how you reacted, though that is, in the end, only my opinion. But it's the same in the end. We both tried to live our lives feeling like there was poison inside us."

Zackel paused. Now came the tricky part.

"Rielle…my poison's gone. Because of you. Maybe I can't return the favor…but I was going to try. Which is why I say this. You envy us, don't you?"

"…what?"

"Yeah, Sparse was a complete shit…but from what you've told me, about your life, about the expectations you never wanted, I doubt that we would have become so bitterly divided if we'd both been hunters. Magic is revered among your people…and when your powers went otherwise, and the grief it brought you…"

Rielle's eyes briefly blazed, murder in them. Zackel steeled himself for her rage, hoping for the best…

His hope was rewarded, as the burning fury passed from Rielle's features, the bitter sorrow washing it away.

"You don't realize just how lucky you are." Rielle said. "To harness the power of the arcane energies, to bend them to your will…so many of you act as if your power proves your inherent superiority, instead of realizing that it's merely a gift of chance. You go around with your chest puffed out and your eyes glinting with self-satisfied egotism…never realizing just what a great benediction you have. That was who was chosen instead of me. A group of frail, delusional braggarts…one after the other…all the same…all the same…I kept waiting for you to show your true colors…"

Rielle fell silent, placing both her hands in her lap and looking down at them.

"Because it was easier to do. Just like my people." Rielle said. "…I'm even worse than they said."

"No. No you're not. That way of thinking is insidious, and has brought down the best and brightest more times than I can count. A tragedy shared by all." Zackel said. "I know how you feel. I envy you too."

"…You're just saying that."

"Rielle, if you REALLY think that's the case…" Zackel said. "Then look up into my eyes and tell me I'm lying. To you, and to myself."

Rielle said nothing, but she did look up.

"You think I wouldn't envy you? That I can't?" Zackel said. "Look at you. So strong, So determined. You take the worst blows of the world and shrug them off, while we'd crumple like paper. You don't take anything less than what you expect, and if you don't get it you tell people where they can get off. When I suffered my worst blow, I tried to hide away from the world and ignore my responsibilities. You took what made you feel terrible and you did your damndest to make it work for you. I have no doubt that if we'd never met, that you would have found the answers and comfort to your pain elsewhere in the world. Me…I'm not so hopeful. So, yes, maybe the magic never spoke to you. That is a great loss. But what you were given instead is in no way lesser to what could have been. You know that. I know you do. And quite frankly, if you don't get back to knowing it, I'm going to find a way to beat the crap out of you until you clue in."

Rielle stared for some time.

The sound was nearly inaudible at first, and Zackel only picked up on it by noticing the slight vibration of Rielle's shoulders and the way her lips turned upright, just a touch, as she lowered her head again.

"…he…ha. Ha." Rielle said. "Dream on, Zack. Dream on."

Zackel finally allowed himself to relax. Maybe, just maybe, he'd gotten through to her. How well, Zackel couldn't say. But at least it was a start, and Light willing, maybe he'd managed to bury the hatchet…

Rielle emptied a canteen and put it aside, casting her vision back towards Zackel.

"So, feel good mage? That you fixed your broken companion?"

"…I fixed nothing. Nothing to fix." Zackel said. "I just offered an alternate perspective, to try and give a reminder to one that had drifted a bit."

"…heh. You know…maybe you're not trying too hard after all. Maybe you're trying just hard enough." Rielle said. "Maybe you are a decent man. Which makes me wonder why I deserve you."

"…the same reason I deserve you, one supposes." Zackel said. "Life is strange. Plans, ideas, stories…sometimes they actually don't end how you expect."

"…If you only knew…" Rielle said, her eyes drifting fully to Zackel's own. "You really think I could have been that great a mage? Better than you?"

And as Zackel fully returned the Draenei's gaze, something in her eyes spoke deeper to Zackel than her words.

The pain had not fully passed from the glowing orbs, but there was something else there. A sense of comfort. The idea that answers had finally come upon a long-troubled mind. A weary, but deep gratitude, looking past an armor of pride and self-sufficiency that had done too much work for so long.

And something else.

A spark…a spark of something that Zackel had only been vaguely aware of, the rest of it buried under his troubles.

He'd sought to help the Draenei, and succeeded. And with that success, and with his weight gone, Zackel finally saw the faint possibility in full light. And though he kept it off his face, it struck him at the core.

What it meant…and what it made him realize, as he found himself thinking back to previous times, the brief, passing possibilities, taken by circumstance or the specters of the past…

"…well…" Zackel said, somehow answering her question despite the unique turmoil that had suddenly boiled up inside him. "With your determination? Your refusal to settle for anything less than your best? And knowing that your best is not a set goal, but just a series of waypoints throughout your life? Even if your family had never been put on any pedestal…yes Rielle. You would have been exceptional. Really, anything you would have chosen…you would have been exceptional."

"You didn't answer my question."

"Better than me? Well, in truth…all I can say…is maybe."

"Well, I'm sorry, but you would have made a lousy warrior. You don't have the bone structure for it." Rielle said. "So it's probably good that you're a mage. That you're the man you are. I…like to think that's what makes _you _exceptional…"

When had Rielle's eyes gotten so close…? Had he moved, or had she?

The Draenei smiled, a smile that spoke of soft invitation…

Before her mouth opened and a massive belch erupted. Zackel recoiled even as Rielle did, brief confusion crossing her gaze. Zackel blinked, before the full realization slammed into him.

Unfortunately, his mouth fired off before his mind caught up with it.

"…and you call MY breath bad?" Zackel blurted out.

"Oh shut up." Rielle said, leaning in and smacking Zackel on the shoulder.

"Because really…"

"No. I meant that. Shut up." Rielle said, before yawning. "I've had to listen to you ramble and ramble…I've had my fill. I want to go to sleep."

"Sleep?" Zackel said.

"What, did that eructation, HA HA ANOTHER BIG WORD, deafen you as well? Bedtime. Move it mage." Rielle said, getting up and slipping past Zackel. "Though I suppose I should be thankful, you made me so bored I'll probably drop off in seconds."

"…Right. So happy to be of service." Zackel said, standing up with a touch of exaggerated dramatics, even as he cursed himself inside his head. "I'll just go back down to _my _bed now…"

Exactly what Rielle threw at him, Zackel didn't know. He dodged it out of force of habit, even as Rielle turned over and away from him, lying down on her furs. Zackel sighed inwardly. Another moment stolen away…

…A moment…?

…Was he…?

"Zackel?" Rielle said. "Could you just stay here for now?"

"…Stay here?"

"Just…here beside me. For a minute." Rielle said, not looking at the mage.

"…I think…I can spare…a minute." Zackel said, heading over and kneeling by the draenei. "…you know, there ARE other things we need to talk about…"

"Can…wait…" Rielle said. "Sleep…now."

"…Right." Zackel said, glancing at the fire.

"Zackel?"

"Yeah?"

"…thank you."

It did not take Rielle to slip off into the mists of sleep. And despite her request for a minute, Zackel stayed there considerably longer, watching her.

The Draenei had not been intending to burp: it has surprised her as much as him. That, Zackel was fairly sure of. Which meant whatever had been happening…

"…ho boy." Zackel said, putting a hand over his face before he rubbed his eyes. He'd been prone to tunnel vision these past few weeks, due to his problems and Rielle's. For the first time that night, they'd both been stripped away. Revealing…

Had she just triggered this change? Or had it been growing all along, slowed by their troubles? Whatever the case was, when he looked at the Draenei again, he still felt it.

The spark. A spark that he'd long wondered if he'd ever feel again. That he had, in some ways, sought again. And yet…here it was, and part of him couldn't believe it.

The spark that Rielle seemed to share.

Zackel cocked his head, looking at the Draenei's peacefully sleeping face. One challenge was overcome, but another loomed. One that was both of lesser and greater importance. And despite what he felt, he wasn't sure how to approach it.

Rielle murmured in her sleep, and Zackel instinctively reached out before he realized what he was doing. Before he could stop himself, his hand was on her arm.

The pain that Zackel braced himself to go exploding through his face or body didn't come. Rielle had not woken up, or lashed out in her sleep. Her muscles were relaxed under his touch.

Zackel slowly removed his hand, watching the Draenei carefully. She did not wake up. She was at peace.

Zackel swallowed before he slowly stood up. If there was one thing he could give her, whatever else, it could be further peace. He carefully crept through the room, picking up his staff along the way, before he left.

Rielle had said some strange things while she'd been drunk. One was the striking accusation that Zackel's storm possessed a mind of its own, and that it was purposely keeping them there. On its face, this seemed ridiculous.

But on its face, Zackel would have never expected the events of the night to end the way they had. Or what he realized he felt towards the troubled Draenei.

This was not about what others might think. It was about her.

And for her, he went up the stairs, and out into the shrieking dark of the continuing storm.

* * *

Maybe some would say that the combination of a lack of proper rest and the effects of the purge on her system was what allowed Rielle the deeper, calming sleep she found herself in, and nothing else. Whether Rielle would have agreed with that or not, she could not have said.

But the peace, if that was what it was, had a price. It kept Rielle from hearing the faint, distant cry.

It kept her sleeping as the form slipped through the room, its gait off and disturbing.

It kept her sleeping as the form returned, and began to stagger towards her…her own knife tucked in its grip.

Only when it knelt down did her senses finally yell a warning.

Rielle's eyes snapped open as she jerked up…

"Ah!" Zackel said, several feet away from the Draenei. "Oh. Sorry Rielle. Did I wake you up?"

"…huh?" Rielle said, blinking.

"Knocked a bucket over, here. Sorry." Zackel said, putting the container upright again.

"…bucket?" Rielle said, as she realized the sense that had come to her aid was hearing, only for what her ears had heard to turn out to be anything but a threat.

"Yeah. Went downstairs for my furs. Picked up your knife while I was down there." Zackel said, holding it up. "I remember you talking about the importance of keeping your weapons clean, so I thought I'd wash it off before I went to bed. In case you forgot, or something."

"…oh." Rielle said, looking up and down at Zackel, noticing he was sitting on his rear instead of actually kneeling. "Something wrong?"

"Yeah. Banged my knee coming down the stairs. Some black ice. Yelled my head off…was a bit worried that might have woken you up. Though it didn't." Zackel said. "Nothing serious. Just made it difficult for me to get around a bit. Don't worry."

"…how does a frost mage slip on ice?"

"Because he's an idiot. Par for the course, hmmmm?" Zackel said, scrubbing at Rielle's blade. "I'll just put this with your axe when I'm done. Unless you want me to wake you up and give it back…"

"Oh…no need…if you make trouble I'll just disembowel…your ass…or something…" Rielle murmured, sleep making a heavy return on her brain. Lying back down, she closed her eyes and attempted to re-discover the deep state of rest she'd been in.

She'd made it about halfway before she sensed the approaching presence.

"Rielle?"

"Hmmmmmm?"

"The storm is not alive."

"…huh?"

"You thought it was alive in some way. I give you my personal word that it's not. It's just a storm. And some bad coincidences."

"…you…so sure?"

"I'd stake everything on it."

"…huh…wonder…" Rielle said, before trailing off.

"It's okay. Sleep. Just didn't want it hanging over you." Zackel said. Rielle didn't hear the last sentence: she'd already returned to her slumber. "Sleep peacefully."

And despite his aching knee, Zackel did as well.

* * *

At least until he woke up to a familiar sensation: the hilt of an axe violently poking him.

"Up! Up up now! My snoring tolerance has been reached!" Rielle said. "Get up Zackel! Up you get!"

"Huh? What? Oh…blaergh." Zackel complained, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. "…wait, was I just dreaming?"

"Don't care. Up!"

"I mean…was there trouble last night?"

"Yes, but that was last night, and this is now." Rielle said. Despite her confirmation, Zackel still had a mild sense of the surreal. After all they'd gone through, seeing Rielle back this way, while a good thing, was also a little off-putting. Then again, considering how she approached life, maybe it wasn't that surprising.

"Can you wait a moment for breakfast Rielle? I need…"

"Breakfast nothing. Get on your feet! Time for training!"

"…what?" Zackel said incredulously. "Training?"

"Yeah! Thanks to all your crap, you cost me several days worth of training! We're going to make up for it!"

"_MY _crap?"

"Yes! Because you're the one who handled it, and got rid of most of it! Ergo, by it last being in your possession, it is YOUR crap! Ha ha, look at me, I am clever, though you're not much competition." Rielle said, giving a grin that was both merry and mocking. "You're not much competition in training either, but I'll live with it. Not your fault you have such poor bone structure."

"I'll bone _your _structure." Zackel said…and then realized just what he _had_ said. "Uh…I mean…er…don't kill me?"

Despite all that had happened between them, Zackel found that the grab and slam on the ground Rielle gave him was no gentler than before.

"Now get up and let's get started, perv." Rielle said. "We have a lot of ground to cover."

"Perv? You're the one who's wrestling me in your underwear." Zackel grumbled as he got up. "I still say you should give me a HANDICAPPPP…!"

Zackel's yell was drawn out and cut off by Rielle dashing around him, seizing him from behind, spinning, and slamming him back down onto the furs. Which was, in the end, the entire theme of the training. Rielle slammed, smashed, hammered, and generally dropped Zackel on everything except his head for nearly fifteen minutes straight, smirking and chuckling all the while. Every single effort Zackel made to get out of it was quickly countered and punished, sometimes before he even realized she was doing so. Eventually, he just swallowed what remained of his pride and stayed down, staring up at Rielle.

"…so." Zackel finally said. "Does that work out all the remaining aggression you had over our disagreements?"

"Make breakfast and then we'll talk." Rielle said. Zackel groaned. "What, you expected me to start cooking for you?"

"Perish the thought." Zackel said, rolling over and rising to his feet.

"In all seriousness, Zackel, are you all right?" Rielle said.

"Like I said. You even teach how to get your ass kicked well." Zackel said, massaging his sore shoulders. For all her domination, he didn't feel too bad. "And in all seriousness myself…"

"I know." Rielle said. "We will talk. But not just yet. I still have some coiled up energy that needs release."

"I aim to please." Zackel said, as Rielle turned around and walked over to the fire. Zackel tried not to stare at the way her body moved as she walked, and his aversion of his eyes kept him from noticing the faint blush that briefly came over Rielle's face before she drank from a canteen she'd set up.

"Right…so. Breakfast. Then what?"

"You should probably feed those ogres." Rielle said, as she began putting on her leather padding-clothes. "Maybe do one last check on the storm…you did tell me it wasn't alive last night, right?"

"Yes. It's not."

"Okay. Just wanted to make sure I myself didn't dream it, like I dreamed up the idea it was alive to begin with." Rielle said, kneeling down and inspecting her armor. "Ugh. The first thing I do when we get out of here is having a nice, big hearty meal, but the second is going to get my armor repaired, cleaned, and polished."

"Right." Zackel said, walking over to the pair's table to inspect what remained of the real food they had. "What sort of training do you want to do?"

"More of your ice-throwing would be good. This time in full armor. Want to see if that affects me." Rielle said. "After that…well, we'll see."

"…yeah." Zackel said, feeling some nervous tension in his gut. How to approach this…

"I don't suppose you learned to summon anything new to eat these last few days." Rielle said, as she began inserting one of her hooves into its corresponding metal boot. "Ah _weerku."_

"What?"

"Like I said, my armor's feeling the long time between touch-ups. I think my boot is starting to warp a bit. _Weerku._ Blacksmiths charge extra for that." Rielle said. "I don't suppose…you know any fix-them-up spells."

"Unfortunately no."

"Well that figures. I just hope you'll prove to have SOME use soon Zackel. If that doesn't make me keel over dead of shock fi-OWTCH!"

"What? Owtch?" Zackel said, looking up from his work. "What's wrong?"

"Something stuck me. Ow, _weerku_, that stings!" Rielle said, yanking her foot out of her metal boot. "What the _weerku_ was that?"

"Let me see." Zackel said, walking over and checking Rielle's leg. There was, as per her complaint, a small bleeding hole a few inches above where the hoof ended. "Ow. Did your boot's damage do that?"

"I don't feel anything…no inward pointing parts." Rielle said, her hand probing inside the metal footwear. "…hold on. Found something."

Zackel let Rielle's leg go to look at her discover: a small black metal nub.

"The heck is this?" Rielle said, turning it over in her hand.

"Not sure. Can I see?" Zackel said, taking the tiny object and inspecting it.

"Any idea?" Rielle asked.

"…not…sure…" Zackel said, bringing the nub closer. Doing so revealed nothing, save for the trace of blue blood that barely showed up on the black color of the mystery object. "It's what cut you though. I see your blood on it."

"Where did that come from?"

"Well, you said your boot seemed to be warping, maybe…" Zackel said, and then the memory washed over him.

_The ogres made said move. In the form of more crossbow bolts. The Draenei warrior staggered back, just a bit__…__and then with a snort of disgust, it slammed its axe down on the bolts, breaking and/or yanking them right out of its armor__…_

"It's one of the projectiles the ogres shot at you. You broke the body off, but the tip stayed in. Must have worked its way through your boot over the weeks you wore it…the warping finishing the trip." Zackel said. "Looks like…"

Zackel's gaze drifted to Rielle…and how she was now leaning with one hand on the wall, a fresh sheen of sweat on her face.

And even as he did that, he took an inadvertent sniff of the air by inhaling through his nose. With the black nub still held in front of his face.

The smell was faint, very faint. But the sickly bitter nature of it brought another memory slamming back to the forefront of Zackel's mind.

"…oh no." Zackel said. "Rielle?"

"Oh shit…not just in my head…I don't feel so good…" Rielle said, wiping her forehead. Zackel stared at the women a split second before he brought the nub directly to his nose and inhaled.

That same smell. That smell he'd only experienced once, but had stuck with him all this time.

Poison. Specifically, the particular vile (and extraordinarily virulent) toxin that rogues favored for their weapons. It was old, but it was there. The crossbow bolt tip had been slathered in it, and some had remained.

"…what the FEL is rogue poison doing on an ogre crossbow bolt?" Zackel said, thinking out loud, before looking at Rielle's pained eyes.

"…you tell me." The Draenei whispered.

For the first time in a long time, Zackel had remembered old feelings, forgotten and thought to be out of reach.

As the Draenei collapsed onto the ground before him, Zackel felt another one roar back into his heart and soul. Fear.

He thought he had felt it before, during the uncertain times and the troubles he'd had during his imprisonment in the old Alterac fortress. He had been wrong.

And even on its heels came another terrible possibility. Another old feeling, threatening to return, with all that it entailed.

Loss.


	23. Memento Mori

Chapter 23: Memento Mori

_**Then.**_

_thud. thud.

* * *

_

_**Some time ago.**_

The tavern of the Blue Recluse had grown quiet in the late hours, virtually all of the people staying or working within it having gone to bed. For those who kept late hours, hanging around a virtually empty bar was not their idea of fun, and as a result, said late-night employees were mostly clustered around the chef's preparation area in the back, playing cards and gossiping.

It suited Silonna Slightedge fine, the gnome rogue striking a match to light her personal candles. The tavern room did offer some light, but not enough for her tastes. Especially not for what she had to do, as she finished lighting her personal source of illumination and pinched the match closed between her two fingers.

Her personal backpack rested on the floor beside her seat: from it, the gnome took a length of treated leather. Spreading it out before her, she produced the several knives she currently used and laid them down on the covering. After checking them over for damage or rust, she slipped a sharpening stone from her belt and ran it over the blades until the edges were honed to hair-splitting perfection.

With that done, she turned to the difficult task, reaching into her backpack and carefully looking through it for a hidden, reinforced pocket. The small container she removed from it was far tougher than it looked: the average Azeroth adventurer would have had to stomp on it repeatedly to damage it and its contents. With a flick of her wrist, Silonna produced a tiny key and opened it the proper way, withdrawing the three vials within before she turned back to her work.

She was not startled to see Zackel there when her eyes finally set on him. She'd heard him coming long before she'd arrived.

"…Wintersoul." Silonna said, her normally flighty, chirpy personality currently sitting in the back of her mind. She was working now, and that demanded she calm down certain aspects of her gnomish heritage.

"Silonna." Zackel said, keeping his reaction to the rogue's strangely neutral tone to himself. "You busy?"

"Not too much." Silonna said.

"Mind if I sit?"

"You can sit, but please keep away from the table." Silonna said, placing the three vials in front of her.

"Right." Zackel said, taking a nearby chair and turning it around, sitting a few feet from the gnome and her work. Silonna did not look at him, as she was running her hand through her green, upwards-flaring bangs, making sure the hair was out of her eyes. Once she'd done that, she reached into her backpack once more and produced a second glove to match the one on her right hand.

"…Zackel, let's not beat around the bush. If this is about your brother…" Silonna said.

"It is. Somewhat."

"…mage, just understand. You are a valuable ally, and I even consider you a friend. But I don't need or care for your opinion, if it comes to that." Silonna said, looking directly at the mage's face. Zackel blinked a few times.

"…you know, if you hadn't warned me off, I might poke you a few times to make sure you're the real Silonna." Zackel said.

"If you want to talk to the 'real' Silonna, Zackel, then having a conversation over breakfast would be better. Right now, I'm doing my job." Silonna said.

"Then I'll get it out of the way." Zackel said. "And be truthful. Yes, Silonna, I was a little bothered at first."

"Why?"

"Well…the general viewpoint of gnomes is…well, you can relate them to children in a lot of ways. Their curiosity, their exploration, their…sometimes apparent lack of common sense…" Zackel said, the gnome giving him a dull glare. "Combine that with their size, and well…you can draw some disturbing possibilities."

"But…?" Silonna said.

"People like the kind that the gnome equals children mindset is talking about…well, men I guess, from the little I've heard of them…they're wrong in the head. Just what and how, I can't say…but from the little I know, they tend to act in a certain way. Tend to have…trouble interacting in a normal fashion if it goes beyond the surface." Zackel said. "Whatever I know about Daldion, I know he's not like that. In my home town, he chased virtually anything with a skirt. Maybe he could use that as a cover for a casual acquaintance…but not for me. Especially since he kept doing it as we've progressed."

"I remember." Silonna said.

"So quite frankly, if you two have…well, then it's quite clear that you're a woman. Cut from a different cloth, maybe…but not the kind of difference that people should be alarmed about. Anything else is really none of my business unless you decide it is."

"…it's nice to know that brain of yours doesn't suffer from selective myopia." Silonna said, her face softening considerably. "It's a bad habit I've noticed among the smart."

"Not easy to be intelligent. But that's another story." Zackel said. "So we're all right then?"

"Of course, Kel. In fact, I have some friends of mine you might want to meet…"

"Whoa whoa whoa. Let's not make acceptance do too much work here. That never works out too well." Zackel said.

"As you wish." Silonna said. "How's that hair dye you made working out?"

"Pretty well." Zackel said, ruffling his blue locks. "I'd offer to help you with what you're currently doing, but I suspect I'd just get in the way."

"Smart man." Silonna said, having finally turned back to her vials. "I repeat, though, please keep your hands and legs away from the table. I don't want to have even the slightest risk I could spill this on it. Or you."

"That potent?"

"Even more then you could realize, mage and alchemist. There are secrets of my breed that only we know." Silonna said, removing the stopper of one of the vials. "Maybe some don't like us for it, but I don't have time for them either."

"Can I ask you a question then?"

"Maybe." Silonna said, as she began to lightly douse one of her blades with the odorless liquid.

"If it's that strong, why do you keep re-applying it?" Zackel said. "I might be an adept in the ways of chemistry, but even I would think that something like that wouldn't degrade so fast. I mean, it's not just that you do this whenever we get back into a stable area. I've seen you do it out in the field, fel, sometimes in the middle of battle. Doesn't really match."

"That's because you're not a rogue, Kel." Silonna said. "You're right. These toxins don't degrade quickly. I refresh them on a constant basis to be kind."

"Kind?"

"It's what those of us who took up this calling to help and serve, rather than more…distasteful reasons, do." Silonna said, before holding up her knife. "With the poison I've just applied, I could use this weapon for three months and not have to worry about applying fresh venom. It would kill. The difference is how long it would take."

"So it's partially a defense thing."

"Somewhat. But when you're like us, Zackel, the difference between a foe dying in a few seconds and several minutes tends to matter little. Barring certain circumstances, of course." Silonna said. "I am not cruel. Whatever I want to kill, I wish to kill it fast. For my sake and theirs. With this technique, my enemies barely feel much of anything before their bodies shut down. So I keep the poison fresh."

"And the cruel ones don't."

"Our concoctions take no risks. Should they enter your system, you _will_ die. But the longer the poison rests on the blade, the longer it will take. Even more so if the weapon has been improperly or purposely treated with lesser amounts of poison then is recommended. Stab someone with a weapon like that, and the victim will take hours to die. Sometimes days." Silonna said. "It's generally not recommended. Only the more potent detoxification spells or treatments could likely counteract our agents, and while people who have that level of skill, in magic or alchemical medicine, aren't very common, they do exist. Hurt someone in that fashion, and you run the risk of them surviving."

"But only with outside aide."

"That's why any smart adventurer either befriends one and brings one along, or drinks prepared counter-agents before they set out into any task that might have you run into a rogue. Some people claim it's a conspiracy or some sort of fraud, but it's their dice to roll. No one in all our records has ever successfully overcome our arts by themselves. They either had the Light, or their or someone else's chemical skills, or both, as an assist…or they died. As said, the reasons people don't like us are not all undeserved." Silonna said. "I like you though, Zackel. So I'll share a little trick with you, in case you ever run afoul of someone who doesn't. Smell this."

Zackel looked at the vial the gnome offered, before cautiously leaning over and taking a sniff.

"…don't smell anything."

"You wouldn't. No one would. Not even druids or the best-trained hunting pets." Silonna said, sealing up the vial and reaching into her poison container, withdrawing another one. "Now, smell this."

This time, the vial did have a scent, a faint but memorably bitter one.

"This difference between the two is the first one is freshly made. This one's several months old. Started to break down." Silonna said. "If I got some of the first into your system, even a drop, you'd likely be unconscious before you could get out the door and dead soon after. Some of this, though? It'd take a lot longer and be a lot more painful. But, that also means we could fetch a priest, or whatnot."

"And if I didn't have a priest, or whatnot?" Zackel said.

"Then the Light help you." Silonna said, her tone solemn. "Because nothing else will."

* * *

_**Now.**_

It was amazing how cruel some memories were when they returned, brought up in a fresh context.

Said memories dominated Zackel's mind, spurred on by the terrible fear the mage had felt when he'd seen his Draenei companion collapse and realized just how. A small part, deep down, had already begun turning over the mystery of how rogue poison had gotten on ogre crossbow bolts, but it was likely going to have to wait a long time to present its findings, if ever. For now, the far more potent disaster had full reign over the mage's mind and heart.

They were trapped in the castle. There was absolutely no way Zackel could drag Rielle to the Southshore or whatever the nearest safe-spot was, no matter how desperate and determined he might have been to do so. And even with said urgent problem driving him on, Zackel doubted it would help him solve the issue of his out of control storm that had trapped them there…

Trapped Rielle here. Trapped her with her damaged armor. If she had been free, she could have gone to a blacksmith. Could have had the armor repaired, the crossbow nub discovered. Instead, she'd continued on with it until the deadly weapon had finally lived up to its purpose.

She was going to die and when the chips were down, when all reason and excuses had been placed, it was Zackel's fault.

…like _FEL._

"Rielle?" Zackel said, leaning over and holding the Draenei by the shoulders. He did not remember dragging the alien to the wall. All he could see was the dullness settling into her eyes, feel the heat beginning to bloom under his hands. The poison, even in such a small amount, worn down by age, being on an 'untraditional' weapon, and having undergone the slow progress of making its way through Rielle's metal boot, was starting to go to work. Even as strong as Rielle was, it would slowly strip out everything that created and drove that strength until she was helpless, and then it would take everything else, leaving her nothing more then cooling meat.

Unless he did something. Unless he did everything in his power and knowledge to stop it. He was not a priest, and the Light had not blessed him with the ability to heal with its grace and majesty…but it _had_ given him a keen mind and a knack for chemistry. He could do something.

He had to.

"Ohhhh…you bugger. You did this to finally beat me in a fight, didn't you? Cheating mage bastard…" Rielle slurred.

"Rielle, listen to me. I know you have some technique to slow your heart rate. Do it now, and do it as best you can. We need to bog down this shit as much as possible." Zackel said. Said technique was technically to aid with blood loss, if Zackel remembered the bits and pieces of melee combat he'd heard discussed over campfires and in inns, but Zackel didn't see how it wouldn't help prevent poison-spreading.

"What are you…going to do…"

"I'm going to try and mix up a counter-agent. It won't _CURE_ you, but…it'll give you a better chance….a chance." Zackel said.

"…do it…" Rielle said. "Don't worry about me…"

"Oh please, I'm too busy being annoyed at you for being such a bother." Zackel said, holding out a hand. He let the world drop away, everything save his power. Making this counter-agent would be a lot harder then the one he'd created to purge Rielle's system the previous night _(Oh when that and her temper had seemed to be his greatest problem)_. For one, he'd need an aspect of Rielle he hadn't needed before: blood.

Specifically, blood tainted by the rogue poison. And he couldn't get it by probing the wound with his finger. Not only would that likely get the poison in _his_ system as well (a bullet he'd already dodged when handling the crossbow nub, something Zackel tried not to think about), but it wouldn't give him enough material. He needed more.

And he didn't have a proper tool to withdraw it: while he'd gotten a surprising amount of basic medical training during his alchemical learning (when one was in the business of creating potions, it was good to know what could go wrong and how to tell the degrees of wrong apart), it wasn't enough that he'd taken to carrying the tools of doctors. So, lacking an 'official' item, Zackel's only option was clear.

Make it.

And hope that all the times he'd spent crafting items out of ice and his lesser dabbling in gnomish engineering and its fondness for odd tools finally served him well.

"Come on…" Zackel whispered, as the makeshift ice syringe began to form between his fingers. He didn't need it to last long: just long enough for him to withdraw some tainted blood and get it in a vial. Between that, and the crossbow bolt tip, he would hopefully have enough to work with.

If there was anything he could actually do.

The near-minute Zackel spent forming the syringe seemed more like an hour, until the world finally returned to his sense of awareness. Zackel turned the ice tool over in his fingers. Nothing left to do but test it.

"Rielle?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm going to get some blood from your wound. It's going to hurt. Brace yourself and try and keep your heart rate down."

"Please mage like you could-UGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Rielle groaned between clenched teeth as Zackel inserted the needle of ice into her wound. Zackel tried not to pay attention, focusing on finding the punctured vein and withdrawing blood and what he'd come for into his syrine's crystalline shaft. Sweat beaded on his brow as he forced the ice to stay completely pristine despite the heat of his hand, Rielle's body, and the liquid he was drawing into it.

The process took nearly another minute. After twenty seconds, Rielle's hand had found Zackel's shoulder. After forty, he was certain her fingernails were about to start scraping on bone.

"Got it." Zackel said, withdrawing the needle.

"Ah, _weerku_…why not take the rest!" Rielle hissed.

"Not needed." Zackel said, immediately standing up and sprinting over to the room's table and his alchemical devices. He located a vial, checked it for cleanliness (he couldn't risk contaminants), and then drained the blue liquid from the ice syringe into it. Sealing up the vial, he picked up a tiny pair of tongs from his small engineering toolkit and dashed back over to where he'd let the crossbow nub fall. He located it after a dozen seconds of frantic searching, sealing it in another vial.

"Rielle." Zackel said, returning to the Draenei's side.

"Hurts…"

"I know. Rielle, listen." Zackel said. "If it's hurting, that's good. It won't FEEL good, but it means your tissues are reacting to the poison. Still alive. If you start going numb, if your legs start feeling heavy…well, I don't plan to let it get that far."

"Why don't you just…put your mouth on it and suck it out?"

"That's a myth, Rielle. Even if I got some, it wouldn't be enough, and it would very likely poison ME in the process." Zackel said. "I'm going to try and brew an antidote. Stay calm, and keep your heart rate as slow as possible. If you feel like you're about to pass out, or start getting numb…call me."

"Oh sure…I'll call you over…make sure I get one good smack in before your treachery does me in…" Rielle said. The attempted good nature of the words struck at Zackel more deeply then any bitterness, misplaced or not, could have.

"Hang in there. I don't know how long this will take." Zackel said, standing up and heading back onto the table. If he'd had more oversight, he would have been amazed how quickly he got every single alchemical chemical and product he had laid out on the table; he'd never been one for speedy assembly. With the last, most crucial items placed in front of him (that being the three and a half remaining healing potions he had left), Zackel did one last quick once over of the material, glanced back at Rielle to make sure she hadn't drifted off unexpectedly, and then turned back.

First, he'd have to get a read on the poison. Zackel got two sampling dishes out, placing Rielle's blood in one and the poisoned arrow tip in the other. He added a chemical to both, and while he waited for the proper reaction to start he quickly got six empty vials out. Three types of chemicals went into three separate vials, making a pair of each. Retrieving a small stopper, Zackel drew up some of the hissing mix that Rielle's blood and his test chemical had become, adding a few drops to three of the vials. Stopping the three up, he turned to the dish that had the poisoned crossbow tip in it, doing the same with the other three vials. With all six sealed, Zackel began studying the results.

Several minutes later, Zackel had a rough idea of what he could do. After a few more minutes testing what remained of Rielle's blood in another fashion, a plan had fully formed.

There _was_ a rough antidote he could make, with odds of about sixty percent success. However, he only had enough of the vital herbs, dusts, and whatnot to make two doses at most, with one being far more likely. Worse, as far as antidotes went, it was pretty substandard. But without it, barring a near-miracle, Rielle would die.

There was also the fact that he'd have to use the healing potions as a base, and by the nature of his antidote he'd be using up all the materials one needed to make more; he wouldn't be able to mix up anything to help with later trouble. But Zackel would burn that bridge when he came to it…

"Zackel…" Rielle said quietly. "I think…my throat is closing up…"

"Shit." Zackel said, dashing back over to Rielle and feeling at her neck. The tissues did seem to be swelling some. "Okay hold on…one second…"

The cream Zackel whipped up in the next forty seconds made his margin of error even smaller, but Zackel didn't think of that part as he created it and headed back over to the Draenei to apply it.

"That should help. Keep it from completely sealing up, in any case." Zackel said. "Rielle, I may have something. Hold on a little longer."

"Sure…take your time…" Rielle said, her eyes losing focus and drifting off. Zackel watched the Draenei for a few more seconds and then immediately returned to his table. He took a few seconds himself to slow his breathing and find his center.

…_Light. I've never asked for anything, I always felt I've been given enough…but…if you don't deem it worthwhile that what I've learned serve me as best it can…at least let me know I did everything in my power._

Opening his eyes, Zackel got to work. Once again, the world fell away.

* * *

When awareness returned, Zackel found himself soaked with sweat. He hadn't even noticed, his attention focused entirely on his antidote. Now it, and a respective tincture, rested in two vials before him, one yellow, one a light pink.

He'd used up two full healing potions in his efforts, leaving him with one and a half for future use. Zackel wiped his forehead with his robe and turned to the ice block he'd frozen his syringe construct in the middle of. A quick bit of precision magic made it crack in half, and Zackel took the syringe and returned to Rielle, who lay limply against the wall.

"Rielle?" Zackel said. Surely he hadn't been so buried in his task that he would not have noticed the one he was trying to help slipping away.

"Tired…" Rielle said.

"Rielle, I have the counteractant. It's in two parts, oral and intravenous. You're going to have to drink the first part. Do you need help?"

"…yes…" Rielle said.

"Okay…hold on…I got you…" Zackel said, lightly taking Rielle's head and tilting it back, opening her mouth as he brought up the yellow vial. He popped its cover with his thumb and carefully tipped the liquid into the Draenei's mouth. The fact that she barely reacted to the likely foul-as-fel mix was something he tried to ignore.

"Okay…that's done. Now the other…Rielle, this is going to hurt." Zackel said, as he expected the puncture zone. A fist size area around the wound had swelled, the flesh turning a sickly green color. Not rotting, but not healthy. "I think some of the toxin is still in the entry zone. I've got to inject the main part of the antidote into the wound. It won't be fun. Brace yourself, and do your best not to move."

"I don't care…about pain…just make sure…you get it done right…"

"I will." Zackel said, carefully using his ice syringe to draw the pink liquid up. Discarding the empty vial, he carefully probed at the swollen area until he located the puncture wound. Having sterilized his fingers before he'd come over, Zackel carefully used his thumb and primary finger to shift the hole's size. It wasn't the neatest process, but it was the best he could do with his limited medical training.

"Here we go." Zackel said, and inserted the needle in.

A few seconds after, Rielle screamed. Had she been at full strength, her cry could have caused legitimate damage to Zackel's eardrum, but the poison had stripped her muscles and lungs of its power, leaving her only able to produce a thin, reedy moan.

To Zackel, though, it might have been the worst sound he'd ever heard. Maybe the scream of his mother as she began to be cooked over a gnoll's campfire and the agonized cry his brother had made when he'd lost his arm were greater, but Rielle's noise of pain was definitely among their ranks.

At least this time, the noise came from his best efforts. If he had anything, he had that.

"Done." Zackel said, withdrawing the ice needle.

"Oh Light…oh…I'll never…yell at a priest…to hurry up with the healing…again…" Rielle said, her breathing having sped up.

"Hold on. I'll wrap the wound." Zackel said, returning to his table to get a bandage that he doused with some of their remaining healing potion. Rielle was silent as he wrapped her injury, her breathing having slowed back down.

"…okay." Zackel said. "It's done. Now we go from here."

"What…happens now." Rielle said.

"The last time you ate was last night, right?"

"Yes…"

"That will help…" Zackel said, grateful he hadn't gotten around to making breakfast before this had happened. "Okay Rielle. I did my best with what I had. What I've given you will hopefully, HOPEFULLY, partially neutralize the poison in your system. Weaken it enough so that your body can break it down."

"…and how long…will that take?"

"…it won't be quick." Zackel said. "If I had more medicine or was a healer the process would be…easier…but as is, it's going to be…very, very unpleasant."

"…how will you know…if it's not working?"

"Like I said. Numbness. Coldness. Everything else…will be a side effect of the battle to come."

"Heh…suddenly your master cold…doesn't seem so kind now…does he?" Rielle said.

"…no. I guess not." Zackel said, as he slipped in close. "Rielle, listen to me. You can overcome this."

"Oh sure…I'd look pretty silly if I couldn't…"

"Rielle, it doesn't matter who you are. Not under these circumstances." Zackel said. "This will be hard. But I will be here, every step of the way. I will do everything I can to help you through this. Strength, self-sufficiency…those are not the only players here. Whatever is to come, no matter what happens, you are not alone."

"…heh…oh great…" Rielle said. "Without me to provide a controlling factor…oh lord, you'll probably be blabbing terrible freeform poetry within twelve hours…might just…make wish…I was dead…"

A deep shudder ran through Rielle. The opening stages of the war within her was starting to gear up.

"But…if I had to ask…I can't think of anyone else who…I'd go through this with." Rielle said. "Bring it on."

Zackel didn't know how much Rielle regretted her choice of words, but he suspected it was quite a bit when, not an hour later, she started vomiting blood.

* * *

_Journal Entry #457_

_Harsh nature of medicine multi-faceted: in order to swiftly be absorbed by her stomach, it's ended up eating away at its lining. In between a deep, constant burning, Rielle's thrown up bloody gastric liquid a few times. I've tried to give her a few drops of healing elixir to help, but it doesn't seem to be helping with either the pain or the vomiting itself._

_She's quiet now, but I doubt it's over this quickly. But I made a promise, and I expect to keep it._

_The issue that comes to mind is not what that will cost me, but what it might, in her head, cost her.

* * *

_

"Ahhhhhhh…" Rielle said. "Hurts…"

"What hurts Rielle?"

"Eyes hurt…light…too bright…" Rielle said. The fact that when Zackel came to her side and checked her face only to find her eyes tightly squeezed shut did not comfort him much.

"Rielle I need to check…let me check…"

With a low groan, Rielle opened her eyes. The light within was flickering oddly, and a few times Zackel swore he could see spots of green blooming in the illumination.

"Can you see me? How many fingers am I holding up?" Zackel said, holding up three.

"Three…ow…" Rielle said, closing her eyes again.

"Give me a second Rielle. Just one second…" Zackel said, quickly heading to his alchemical materials. Impressing himself with his speed, he quickly managed to create an eyedrop-type relief (but anything in that vein wasn't going to be in the cards much longer, with the lack of supplies he had), returning to the Draenei and administering it.

"This should help." Zackel said, tearing another strip off his robe (a tiny part of his lamenting the repair costs he'd be faced with when he returned to civilization) and tying it around her eyes. "I'll check in an hour."

"Zackel…"

"Yeah?"

"How long has it been?"

"…I'd say about eight hours. Give or take."

"…wonderful." Rielle said softly. Zackel couldn't recall a more improper use of the word.

* * *

_Entry #458_

_The eyes, at least, were relieved, but other symptoms remain. There's been a little more vomiting, which is starting to be combined with a nasty cough. At least the mucus and sputum Rielle's hacking up doesn't have blood in it any more. That's something I guess._

_I'm going to draw some blood in a little while, try and see if my antidote is having any effect…_

_I don't know what I will do if I find out it's not._

_Maybe do my best to comfort her, I suppose.

* * *

_

Zackel had just been resting his eyes, or so he thought, when Rielle's voice reached him, causing him to jerk up.

"-kel!" Rielle called. "Help…"

"What is it?"

"Need…washroom…" Rielle said. "Can't…move…muscles won't work…"

"On it." Zackel said. His first, brief effort to lift Rielle confirmed he wasn't going to be able to get her to their proper lavatory: he wasn't strong enough to move that much dead weight. "Netherspit. Rielle, we're going to have to improvise."

"…how?" Rielle asked, as Zackel's eyes darted around the room and settled on the washing tub.

"Come on…over here…" Zackel said, getting his shoulder beneath Rielle's arm and dragging her up. He couldn't bring her all the way to the actual washroom, but he would be damned if he couldn't move her several feet. Which he did, aiding her to the washing tub and helping her prop herself on the edge.

Zackel really didn't know if Rielle was too out of it or distracted by her other troubles enough to feel any shame at what came next. For his part, Zackel did his best to block out all the extenuating aspects of the situation and focus entirely on the mechanics.

Just to be sure, once Rielle was done and back down on her bedding, he waited until she was asleep before he cleaned up and took samples from her business.

Part of him wondered who would find the whole event harder to forget.

* * *

_Entry #459_

_I can't really tell much. The readings I got from her urine MIGHT indicate a higher level of toxins then normal…but I lack the equipment to tell for sure. Her alien nature doesn't help: her biology is fairly similar but even the most minute differences cause problems for something like this. Doesn't leave me a lot of hope for the blood testing._

_Considering hope's really all I have left, might be best to ration it.

* * *

_

"Don't wanna…" Rielle said, as Zackel tried to get the ice chip into her mouth.

"Rielle, now more then ever, you need to stay hydrated. Maybe you can't keep food down, but you can go some time without food." Zackel said. It reminded him that he'd fallen behind aiding the ogres, and that he'd have to spare a minute if he could to get them what they needed.

"No…" Rielle said, pawing weakly at the mage. Zackel just gently pressed the issue, which ended in Rielle taking the ice chip and sucking it down to nothing.

"How long?"

"I don't know…eighteen hours, give or take." Zackel said. "I need to draw some blood."

"…wait…first…Zackel, tell me a story."

"A story?"

"When I was little…mother would tell me stories…tell me a story…"

"…okay." Zackel said, recalling a fairy tale his own mother had told him. "Once upon a time, there were three foxes…"

* * *

_Entry #460_

_Blood is maddeningly ambiguous. Once again unable to tell if it's a matter of equipment, tester skill, alien factor, or outright failure._

_Three reasons for me being unable to properly tell if antidote is working, against one that confirms that it's not._

_Will take majority here.

* * *

_

"Uggghhhhhh…" Rielle groaned. Her skin had been hot to the touch almost since the beginning, but now it felt like it was about to ignite beneath Zackel's hand, her temperature spiking dramatically. Zackel was glad that he hadn't railed against his 'master cold' after Rielle's comment: here, his gifts from it were worth their weight in gold.

"It's all right Rielle…" Zackel said, kneeling over her and manifesting a chamber of flowing cool air, venting the heat around her and coming off her body into the fireplace, adding it to the fire there. "It'll be all right…"

"…thank you sam…you are a boiled man….freshly chopped cabbage…" Rielle said. Zackel tried to ignore the strange words: high fevers could do funny things to your mind.

After an amount of time, Zackel didn't know how long, the alien's temperature began to drop again. Zackel didn't know if the fact that the alien had gone quiet and slipped off into sleep shortly afterward comforted or disturbed him.

He quickly got a lesson fifteen minutes later, when he was taking a bite from one of his mage-created food items and Rielle began to have a seizure.

"SHIT!" Zackel said, tossing the bun aside and scrambling over to Rielle. He swiftly turned her onto her left side, adjusting her fur 'pillow' beneath her head and checking her mouth to make sure it was clear. Another quick scan confirmed that there were no items nearby she could impact her body on, which left Zackel to carefully crouch by her side, lightly cradling her head as her body seized and jerked, the mage counting off the seconds.

It took a little over two minutes for Rielle to finally stop moving. Zackel sighed in relief: over five minutes was the danger zone. Just to be on the safe side, the mage made sure that the wrongful advice that humans could swallow their tongues during seizures help true for Draenei as well, quickly, and then waited to see if the seizure caused Rielle to vomit. It didn't.

"…urrrrrrrrrrrrrr…" Rielle said some time later.

"It's okay Rielle. I'm here. I'm here." Zackel said.

"…how long…?" Rielle eventually said.

"…I don't know." Zackel said. "I've…lost track."

* * *

_Entry #461_

_Checked her wound: it doesn't seem to be getting better OR worse. Too much I don't know. About rogue poison. About Draenei bodies. About my own profession._

_Fever's flared up again, along with the cough. I want to estimate that we're entering something approaching a final stretch, but I just can't tell._

_Haven't slept much. Trying to keep ahead of it. Can't risk Rielle being alone if I doze off too deeply._

…_I think she called me a paper clip in our last 'exchange'. Even based on all that's happened, that stands out to me for some reason.

* * *

_

Zackel jerked up as Rielle groaned, the reality of his situation returning. The Draenei had been quiet for some time. A long, comforting time. So quiet that Zackel had found said quiet slipping into his head. Before the noise and all it rode on returned.

"Rielle?" Zackel said.

"Hurts…" Rielle said. "Whole body…hurts…"

"How does it hurt?" Zackel said, feeling along the Draenei's limbs and torso.

"Burns…like…fiery knives…ahhhhhhhhhh…!" Rielle said, before turning onto her side and coughing so loud and long that Zackel swore she was going to expel part of her lungs (or worse) in the process. Zackel held onto her shoulder, feeling her hot, dry skin beneath his hand.

"…it's on the ceiling." Rielle said.

"What?"

"The ceiling…the voice comes from the ceiling…!" Rielle said, rolling back onto her back, her eyes wide. "It's telling me lies…it's making me sick…!"

"Rielle, listen to me. There is nothing on the ceiling. It's just me." Zackel said.

"CEILING!" Rielle shrieked, before she tried to surge up to her feet. Zackel's eyes widened before he reached to grab her.

Much to his great surprise, the alien yanked him up with her almost all the way before the mage finally managed to pull her down. Naked panic began flooding through his mind: he might have remembered how to treat seizures from his basic medical studies, but he was at a loss for how to handle this.

"RIELLE! IT'S ONLY ME! JUST ME!" Zackel said, struggling to get the woman down before her sudden adrenaline explosion caused her to hurt herself.

"LIAR! LIARRRRRRR!" Rielle screamed, clawing at Zackel's eyes. Zackel tried to get a grip on the woman's hands and shove her down at the same time, feeling the alien's nails scrape skin off his forehead as he struggled. Snarling, Rielle went for his throat with her teeth, forcing Zackel to grab her by one of her horns and yank her head back.

When that didn't work, he grabbed at her head tendrils.

The tone of Rielle's shriek went from pain to outright violation, and her other hand snaked up, seizing onto Zackel's own. The movement, however, caused her to lose her balance, and Zackel forced her back down on the ground.

"RIELLE! IT'S JUST ME! JUST…!" Zackel yelled.

The terrible pressure erupted in Zackel's right hand a second before the pain did. Rielle still had it in a frenzied clench, and she'd closed said clench with every bit of strength she could muster.

And even after all she'd endured, what she could muster was a lot.

Zackel didn't so much hear his own scream as he felt it reverberate in his head, even as Rielle crushed his right hand in her grip. It was only by the thinnest of margins that Zackel managed to rein-in his response and change his retaliation from a storm of ice to a downwards-directed cold wind.

It was enough, as the wind slammed Rielle fully onto the ground and loosened her grasp. Zackel immediately snatched his agonizing hand away and turned his non-wounded side towards Rielle, his left hand up. Rielle shuddered where she lay, her eyes unfocussed and barely aware of where she was. Zackel tried to ignore the pain and focus on the Draenei, as she lay there, blinking.

Zackel didn't know how long it was before her eyes closed and her breathing slowed, the alien slipping back into the calm of sleep, her episode over. Zackel watched her another few minutes before he finally trusted the situation enough to look at his hand.

The pain of just moving it quickly made Zackel realize that this time, he hadn't dodged the bullet. Blood was leaking from a small cut on its upper side, and while the fingers did not feel damaged, the sheer grinding pain that came from even trying to move them or his wrist made it clear that several of the small, vital bones in the appendage _were_, and severely at that.

"Ah…oh fu…ow…" Zackel said, taking his injured hand with the other one, trying to inspect it. Each touch sent a new stab of pain down his arm, Zackel's teeth creaking in his jaw from how tight it was.

"…whoever…is running this world…" Zackel managed to rasp out. "I don't…appreciate their sense of irony."

* * *

_Final (?) Entry_

_Up until now, I have written this journal solely for my own thoughts. This last entry is not for that._

_I expected a lot of bad possibilities when I tried to treat this poison, but uncontrollable violence was not one of them. That got my right hand, my primary hand, crushed. And while I would like to think that's as bad as it's going to get, I am not that optimistic._

_I am not that stupid._

_This entry is for anyone who finds this journal who is not me. I am recording what I hope is not my last series of choices. And before anyone wonders why I did not use my last remaining healing potion on my hand…_

_I did. I spared myself two drops. It didn't help much, and it will severely cripple my ability to do magic…but I might yet need the rest. For Rielle._

_She didn't mean to hurt me. She's sick. I have hope that she can overcome it._

_If you are reading this, she did not. Perhaps you have already found bodies._

_I do have regrets for my choice, but I would have more if I'd chosen otherwise._

_Just know if you are reading this, things went wrong. If things go right…_

_I'll be tearing this journal page out._

_Sincerely_

_Zackel Wintersoul

* * *

_

Writing with his lesser-used hand had taken a lot longer then Zackel had expected. During a few times, Rielle had stirred, causing Zackel to break off and watch her. When she settled back down, he continued until he was finished, closing the journal before he looked at his injured right hand.

The healing potion had, as said, only helped a little with the injury, slightly repairing the cracked and fractured bones. Until Zackel could get it properly tended to, he'd need to keep it bound up. For his sake, and Rielle's.

The issue of that problem quickly came apparent: there was no real wood in the room that Zackel trusted to serve as a split. The buckets, table, washing tub, and miscellaneous wooden items all had something wrong with them (mostly concerns about infection) that caused Zackel to rule them out. The fact that he still needed wood eventually brought him to the Thrust board.

Zackel looked at the gift, given long ago to him by Maginor Dumas. He'd done a lot of thinking, and learned a thing or two, over that board.

But it was just a thing, in the end.

Zackel still felt a deep twinge of sorrow as he broke it apart, sifting through the cleaner, finer wood of its remains and using selected pieces and two more strips cut off his robe to bind up his hand. Once that was done, he tucked his journal away into a corner before settling back down, watching Rielle.

Time passed, as it always did.

"…in the Light, there is no beer…" Zackel eventually began humming to himself. "That's why we drink it here…and when we are gone from here…our friends will be drinking…"

"All the beer…" Rielle whispered.

"Rielle?" Zackel said once more, carefully crawling over. "Can you hear me?"

"….I can't feel my body."

A cold chill crept down Zackel's spine. He did his best to keep it off his face, reaching out with his remaining hand and placing it on Rielle's leg.

"Can you feel that?"

"…are you touching my leg? I think…"

"I am." Zackel said, before placing his hand on Rielle's stomach and pressing down lightly. "Where am I touching?"

"Stomach."

"…this…might be a good sign." Zackel said. "You just had an…incident…"

Rielle's eyes remained blank. Zackel took it in stride: it didn't really matter if she remembered what she'd done or not.

"It caused you to suddenly move around a lot, violently. If we're looking at that episode as the last hump you needed to get over, your muscles and nerves might just be burned out. Numb, but not bad numb. Worn out instead of gone out, if you know what I mean."

"…and…if it's not a good sign?"

"…If you couldn't feel my hand, it would far more likely be a bad sign." Zackel said. As far as he knew, he was telling the truth.

"…how long?"

"…I don't know." Zackel said. "I think soon. Maybe…hopefully."

Rielle was quiet for a moment, before taking in a long, slow breath. The choking despair in the noise made Zackel forget about any pain he had.

"I don't wanna die…" Rielle said, her voice quivering and on the verge of a sob.

"You're not dead yet." Zackel said, putting his left hand on her shoulder.

"I don't wanna die…not like this…" Rielle said. "If I had to die…I wanted to die with purpose…die on my feet…not on my back…"

"You're not going to die Rielle."

"But you don't know." Rielle said, her voice raw with emotion. The battle within her to break down the poison had long exhausted any defenses or fronts she could put up about herself. To someone like Rielle, Zackel knew how important image was. How much it comforted her own inner demons. But those resources had been stripped away, leaving her with naked fear she might not have felt since the orcs had massacred her species. Worse, she may have gotten so good at repressing her old memories and using her gained strength to filter them that, with all that gone, the fear that should have been familiar was anything but.

Even if Zackel had been far more embittered against the Draenei warrior for her actions then he was, he doubted he could have acted any differently as he saw that. For all the variables in human interaction, and all the myriad ways and degrees said interaction occurred, there was always a yin/yang core factor. You either had a sense of decency, or you didn't.

Sometimes Zackel had envied those who lacked said decency. People like them wouldn't have let their failings torture them so.

But in the end, said people did not experience such things because they were unable to comprehend that they could fail. Without failure, there was no true success. Just opinion. And opinions, as the saying went, were like assholes. Everyone had one.

"Know that? Maybe not. But I know you." Zackel said, taking Rielle's hand in his and holding it firmly. Any outsider might have commented on the risk of such a move. It might have comforted the Draenei, but if she abruptly snapped into another manic state, or had another seizure, Zackel could very well end up with TWO broken hands. That thought, however, did not even enter his mind.

The risks of decency.

"And I know that if death wants you…it's going to have to devote more of an effort than this. A fel of a lot more."

Rielle looked at Zackel a moment before closing her eyes. The emotion was still evident in her breathing, but Zackel was sure it was calming.

"…Zackel?"

"Yes?"

"What's your name?"

"…pardon?" The mage said.

"Your first name. The one you shared with your parents. The one you covered with Wintersoul. Your true name." Rielle said.

"…Jude. It's Jude." Zackel said. "Zackel Jude."

"…my name…Rielle…it means…roughly… 'Strong In The Light'…" Rielle said. "I think…I always tried to take that…at face value…but…but I…"

"Shhhhhhhh." Zackel said. "I understand. Rest now."

"I'm sorry…"

"It's all right."

"I'm just so sorry…"

"…you only need to be as sorry as necessary, Rielle. I accept what you mean. Nothing else is needed. Rest."

"…Zackel…if the worst happens…will you…make sure you remember me?"

"…I don't think even the worst mind violations or head injuries could cause me to forget." Zackel said. "Considering how many of the latter you inflicted on me, doubly so."

"…I…" Rielle said. "Can live…with that…"

Zackel felt Rielle's hand go limp in his.

Fortunately, it just signaled her return to sleep, as her chest continued to rise and fall. Zackel laid her hand down before checking her vitals. Her heartbeat and breathing seemed normal, and her skin had cooled off sometime during the manic episode and the little exchange the pair had just had.

Zackel waited until the Draenei was deep in sleep before he took some more blood.

* * *

"…_so…is it my time then?"_

"_Is that what you believe?"_

"_I see you, glowing there. I don't have a sense of what I know…I wish it didn't have to be this way…"_

"_Ah child…you see me not because it is your time, but because part of you thinks it should be. But the light does not shine for those who seek to atone. That is for the world you know. It does much more there."_

"…_am I dreaming?"_

"_Perhaps. That is for you to decide. But you do not yet need come here. How that will come about, who can say. For now child…there is elsewhere for you to be. Until we truly meet. Farewell."

* * *

_

Rielle's eyes fluttered open, the thick fog over her mind beginning to lift. She was vaguely aware of a faint cooking smell.

"Rielle?" Zackel said, the Draenei turning her head towards the voice.

Zackel knelt by the fire, a cooking pot over it. Where he'd gotten that, Rielle couldn't say. Maybe he'd always had it and she hadn't noticed.

"How do you feel?"

"I…" Rielle said, more of the world returning to her. "I feel…"

Rielle sat up partially, surprising herself in the process. Lifting her arm, she traced it along her leg and torso.

"…like shit." Rielle finally said. "Worse, shit that's been stepped on. Ugghhhh…"

"But you can feel your body, right?"

"Every pained, exhausted inch of it." Rielle said, shifting slightly on her side.

The fact of what that meant dawned on Rielle a second later. Some parts of the fog had been slower than others to leave.

"I don't feel numb any more." Rielle said. "I can move…it's hard but I can…"

"I was correct. We did get over the hump." Zackel said, heading over and crouching by Rielle, holding up a vial. "Did more blood tests after you went back to sleep. I had trouble getting a baseline over the past few days, but I eventually nailed it down. The fact you can move again confirms it. My latest tests are about 70 percent sure that the toxin's almost gone from your body. You made it."

"…Zackel? What happened to your hand?" Rielle said.

"…as said, we just got over the hump. Said hump was pretty bad, for both you and me." Zackel said, glancing at his injured hand.

"…I did that?"

"The poison did." Zackel said. "If it's the price I had to pay to beat it, well, I'd have sacrificed a few more bones."

"…but hands are so important to mages…"

"I'll be all right." Zackel said. "As soon as we make sure you're improving, I'll put a little more healing potion on it. For now, here." Zackel said, offering Rielle one of the canteens. "Drink up, slowly."

Rielle did, finding out that her throat was parched in the process. The whole canteen, even drained at a controlled pace, did not satisfy it completely, but Zackel had another at hand to deal with that.

"Once we see how you react to that, and depending how you feel…I'm making a mild soup. Try and see if we can get some of that into you. Recover your strength."

"…how long has it been?" Rielle said.

"Can't say. Three days, maybe four? Time sort of blurred together after a while." Zackel said, heading back over to the soup pot. "You're not completely out of the woods yet, my lady. Lie back down for now."

Rielle did, resting her head as Zackel puttered around her.

"…I…I don't remember much." Rielle said.

"Not surprising. You had at least one fever dream. When your body's in a state like yours was, re-collection's often slipshod."

"…Zackel? Did I tell you my name?"

"…you mean what Rielle means? Yes. You didn't dream that." Zackel said, sitting by Rielle. "Do you remember what I told you?"

"…Jude." Rielle said. "What does Jude mean?"

"Praise, roughly." Zackel said, sipping from his soup cup. "But you can sing mine another time."

"Why not…now? Considering the source material…it will probably only take five seconds."

"You are definitely getting better." Zackel said, reaching out and feeling Rielle's forehead. Warm, but within an acceptable range.

"…Zackel?"

"Yes?"

"…during this…period…did you grab my cranial tendrils? They ache."

"…yes." Zackel said. "I did so as a last resort and for good reason, and believe me, you probably hurt me a lot more in exchange. But I will ask for your forgiveness for that."

"…give me some soup, then we'll talk." Rielle said. And in the end, the warm broth went a long way to helping Rielle forget her pain.

* * *

"Zackel? What are you doing?" Rielle asked some time later. The mage had changed the dressing on her leg (and said injury definitely looked better, though it was still discolored and sore), and afterwards the warrior had laid back down to resume her rest, Zackel sitting against the nearby wall.

"Going to see you off to sleep again. Then, I'll see if I can't catch up on my own." Zackel said.

"Leaning against the wall?"

"I'll be fine. Get more rest, Rielle. I'll feel better when you are."

"…no. Not like this." Rielle said, rolling over on her stomach. The effort taxed her more then she would have liked to admit, but she had enough strength to start crawling over to Zackel.

"Rielle, what are you doing? Lie back down…!"

"I've spent the last few days lying on my back. I'm as sick and tired of it as I feel." Rielle said. "If you're gonna watch me, then I may as well…be right close at hand."

"Rielle…"

"Please." The Draenei said. "I…would find it comforting."

"…well…" Zackel said, his eyes scanning upwards. "…I can't see…how it would _hurt…_so just stay there, I'll do it."

"Do something about this floor too. It's cold."

"Sorry, it's not in my contract and I am not re-negotiating it at the moment." Zackel said. He immediately showed that he was lying by getting one of Rielle's furs and helping her onto it. With that done, he put more wood on the fire and then assembled the furs where he'd been leaning against the wall, lastly helping Rielle over to them and settling her down, quickly retrieving the last fur and sitting down next to her. Rielle settled against Zackel as he brought the fur up over both of them, leaning her head on his shoulder.

"Oh yes…this is much better if just for the difference."

"Hopefully not a crick in the neck producing difference." Zackel said, before he lightly placed an arm around Rielle's shoulders. The action made her relax further, something Zackel did take notice of.

"…just so you know, mage." Rielle said. "If you even begin to make any sort of assumption, I'll break your other hand."

"Please. Why would I want to make an ass out of you and Mption? I don't know who HE is, but he apparently had very cruel parents."

"I'm just going to chalk up that line to one last gasp from my fever." Rielle said, closing her eyes. Silence settled back onto the room, save for the crackling of the fire.

Zackel felt his own weariness returning, a crushing weight he likely wasn't going to last long under. It did not, however, keep him from noticing the warmth he felt. Not just from the blankets and Rielle's presence. The warmth within, finally free beneath the fear and the efforts to combat it.

Though it did keep him from noticing that Rielle was speaking for some time, albeit in a tone so softly one would have to strain to hear.

"Rielle? You said something?"

"What…oh. Not to you." Rielle said. "I was just…giving thanks to the Light."

"Oh?"

"…it's been a long, long time since I did that. Actually, I've done a lot of cursing it." Rielle said. "I would like to think I wouldn't forget to do this, but just in case…I can't promise I won't ever do that again, or who knows what else…but for now, I'm thanking it for the strength it gave me. For giving me another chance to choose my own terms. And…for giving me you."

Zackel stared across the room, not sure what to say. Rielle herself said nothing further. Shortly thereafter, she'd fallen back asleep.

After a bit, Zackel raised his hand and gently began to stroke Rielle's hair. She did not awaken at the touch, and Zackel continued the motion as he pondered.

Maybe the bloom hadn't come off the rose. Maybe, to protect its exceptional flower, the rose had just had exceptionally potent thorns. Maybe, just maybe, Zackel had finally traversed them all.

Maybe it was time for the blossom.

He'd told her every truth he had except one. Perhaps it was time for that.

But that could come later. Zackel's exhaustion would no longer be denied. Sleep finally found him and carried him off.

Rielle did not stir from her position throughout the night.

* * *

But the night, as it always did, gave way to day…

_thud. Thud._

The storm continued to shriek around the Alterac Fortress as it had for so long.

_Thud. Thud._

The fire had burned down to mostly embers as Zackel began to wake up. Rielle remained at his side, and with his mind still half-asleep, all he was really aware of was her heartbeat, feeling the steady pulse against his chest.

_Thud. Thud!_

Zackel's mind debated whether to get up or slip back into sleep. The latter seemed far more appealing…

_Thud! Thud!_

Though Rielle's heartbeat had its own appeal…

_Thud! THUD!_

The realization cut through Zackel's torpid state, a dagger of ice-cold rattling itself in his spine.

_The fortress was not the only building around besieged by the storm. There had been others, equally as imprisoned as the fortress…_

He could feel Rielle's heartbeat…but it was _not_ the source of the noise that had slowly dominated his attention.

_THUD! __**THUD!**_

Outside, the storm howled.

_Who can say what some would do under such circumstances…_

Inside, Zackel opened his eyes.

_**THUD! THUD!**_

Perhaps the rose had not yet come back into reach…

_Down in the basement, the remains of the ogre clan stared at the wall. The wall that had begun producing the constant, ever-increasing hammering…_

Perhaps the thorns were far crueler then even Zackel realized….

_**THUD!**_

"Zackel?" Rielle said. "Do you hear that?"

"…I think we have trouble."

And down below, the fist smashed through the wall.


	24. War Drums: The Architects of Fear

Chapter 24: The Architects of Fear

Writer's Note: All right dear readers, you wanted fast chapters? Then expect for the following arc to be updated once every few days. And the more reviews I get, and the longer they are (within context, of course), the shorter those 'few' days will be. No I'm not holding the story hostage for updates, I'm bribing you with shorter downtime between those updates if you give me what I want. There's a difference. If you have a problem, then go roll up a worgen and track me down with its nose. Oh right, at the time of this posting, you can't. HA.

Wait, what's this about a closed beta?

Oh yes, and sometime in the next several chapters, you will see a line marked with a star. I would like to thank Azzur and his Let's Play of the original Warcraft for creating said line which I am shamelessly borrowing.

* * *

"_The sewers belch me up  
The heavens spit me out  
From ethers tragic I am born again  
And now I'm with you now  
Inside your world of wow  
To move in desires made of deadly pretends  
Till the end time begins_

_Is it bright where you are  
Have the people changed  
Does it make you happy you're so strange?  
And in your darkest hour  
I hold secret's flame  
You can watch the world devoured in it's pain…"_

_Strength all._

_Strength keep you alive. Make you powerful. Give you what you want. It cannot, it not strength._

_Nothing stop strength._

_Nothing stop me._

_Not storm. Not hungryness. Not weaklings._

_Strength is mine._

_All is mine.

* * *

_

"Was that the front door?" Rielle said.

"I don't really know or care WHAT it was. Whatever it was, it didn't sound friendly." Zackel said, grabbing his staff off the wall before he turned back to Rielle. He was not surprised she was trying to get up.

"Don't give me that look." Rielle said, partially up and leaning against the wall with one hand.

"Rielle, you just…"

"I KNOW what I just went through." Rielle snapped, glaring at the mage with defiant will. "But if you think I'm going to hide and cower in a corner…"

"Even if you're feeling better, your body can't be anywhere near recovered…!"

"Then you don't know me." Rielle said. She felt a pang of guilt at the depth of her lie: in truth, she still felt like a herd of Elekk had trampled over her body and one had come back to practice its newly-acquired tap-dancing lessons on her head. But that didn't matter. This was her element, no matter what after-effects a rogue poison had caused. She'd trained for it, and even if she felt terrible, she _knew_ she could muster some sort of effort against whatever was coming. Even if it was only a fraction of her best, it was better then letting Zackel stand alone.

Zackel gazed helplessly at the woman. He wanted to tell her to stop being idiotic, that she was a liability. But he knew all that such an action would do would be to delay whatever preparations they could muster even more.

"All right then." Zackel said, turning towards the table across the room. "Hold on."

"Don't you DARE go off without me!" Rielle said.

"I'm not going anywhere. I'm getting our last healing potion." Zackel said. "You can drink it. Maybe it'll give you a boost."

"Zackel, no! You need that potion…!"

"And what I _want_ is for you to be safe." Zackel said, whirling around and pointing with his splinted appendage. "I can make do with what I have. You, I'm not so confident in, and THAT'S FINAL."

"Zackel…" Rielle said, having semi-stumbled over to her axe. While it felt like it weighed three times what she was used to, she still managed to pick it up.

"Maybe we'll be lucky. Maybe it's a rescue effort." Zackel said. Considering he could still feel the storm going with his magical senses, he didn't have much hope of that being true.

"Oh blast. And me in my underwear. People will talk." Rielle said, trying to call up all she'd learned about her art of war. She'd fought with injuries before, and when she hadn't been springtime fresh. She could still fight now. Maybe she couldn't fight long, but no enemy would last long with her…

"Oh like you care…" Zackel said, having reached the table as he picked up the healing vial.

A second afterward, the sensation began.

"What anyone else…thinks…" Zackel said, confusion in his tone.

The buzzing in the mage's head ramped up so suddenly and violently that Zackel felt like he'd been punched in the forehead. He recoiled, the vial dropping from his damaged fingers.

_It's time mage to rise or fall destiny awaits us…_

The fact that a voice had just spoken in his head might have caused Zackel more alarm, had it not also caused him to drop their vital healing elixir in his surprise. With eyes as wide as saucers at his fumble, he lunged downward for the container.

Unfortunately, he was not the type to command incredible reflexes. Fortunately, the people who had constructed the vial did know how to do their jobs, and as a result, the vial just bounced on the floor instead of breaking. Unfortunately again, Zackel's effort (and failing) to overcome his shortcomings meant he ended up kicking the vial across the room.

"Shit!" Zackel said, chasing after it, transitioning his staff to his injured hand, holding it feebly with his thumb as he reached the vial.

This time, the buzz came in his teeth. Zackel jerked his head towards the door that lead into the room.

It exploded in a cacophony of fire, partially broken apart and partially blown off its hinges. The heat and the shockwave slammed into Zackel, knocking him backwards and against the door behind him. Rielle barely had time to make her own exclamation before the shockwave slammed into her: in her weakened state, it was enough to knock her sprawling.

"Zackel!" Rielle said.

"Fel…" Zackel said, trying to push himself up with his good hand, his eyes locked onto the black smoke where the door had been.

The figure loomed through it, the darkness of the smoke almost closing on him…

_Huge and black, the void walker expanded through the doorway…_

_Through the burning fire came the man'ari, unaffected and filled with sadistic joy…_

"So. Human. You live." The ogre said. "Perhaps all this not waste after all."

Zackel stared at the ogre, taking in his form. The ogre's dusky blue face and stained black teeth were new to him, as was the gnarled dyed-red wood staff in the ogre's hand. But he recognized two things, and that was enough.

One was his robes, all midnight black.

And the other was his voice.

"_MUG__'__THOL! HE LIES! HE PREPARES A TRICK! STOMP HIM! STOMP HIM!__"_

"You." Zackel said.

"So, you understand the past, human." The ogre said. "How fitting it does not ensure your future."

"You yelled at Mug'Thol. Forced me to start this blizzard…to try and survive…" Zackel said, fully getting to his feet. He glanced at Rielle, who was also getting up: she met his eyes and returned a wary expression that indicated she wouldn't just charge in. Zackel, having spared his eyes a second away from the ogre, returned to his form. "…magi. An ogre magi."

"The greatest of all Crushridge. I am Grel'borg the Miser. Your end." Grel'borg said.

"…you threw that fireball too. The one that knocked me through the air, got the ogres' attention…started everything." Zackel said, trying to swallow and soothe his dry throat. "Why…?"  
"You are undeserving." Grel'borg said, pointing at Zackel with his staff. "I _will_ show that. I will crush you as my clan should have, and grind your organs into a stew. I have not done all I have to accept otherwise."

"…what are you _talking _about?" Zackel said.

"You not know. That all is needed." Grel'borg said, thrusting the staff out. "_GRITEAK!"_

The fireball erupted from the ogre magi's staff, streaking towards Zackel.

The mage's counter, unfortunately, was lacking, the mage attempting to re-route his magic through his good hand.

Which was his left, lesser-used hand.

Which meant that all Zackel did was shave off some of the fireball's power before it struck him and exploded, blowing him backwards through the other door, said door tearing off its hinges in the process.

"ZACKEL!" Rielle yelled, hefting her axe and charging. The weakness struck her immediately, the sensation that she was moving as slow as molasses compared to her usual pace. In her prime, she'd have been on the ogre magi before he finished turning her way.

As she was, Grel'borg shot the fireball at her before she was even two-thirds of the way there. The blast exploded at her feet and tossed her backwards, her usual graceful recovery roll turning into a bone-rattling tumble, her axe flying from her hands. She came to a stop, breath exploding through her lungs.

"You matter little." Grel'borg said, lowering his staff slightly to aim it at the Draenei. "But I no fool. I burn you and then burn him."

The staff tip began to glow as Rielle tried to get up. Weaponless and essentially stark naked, she knew she wouldn't take the blast as well as Zackel's ragged but still magically enchanted for protection robe would.

"…so. You gonna give me some answers on how you got here?" Rielle said as she prepared her last charge.

"No." Grel'borg said, and fired.

The long, thin shards of ice shot out, the barbed hooks impaling themselves into the side of Grel'borg's face and yanking. The ogre magi bellowed as the frost weapons tore into his cheek, yanking him slightly to the side and causing his blast of fire to go wild. The attack missed Rielle by about nine inches, the Draenei feeling the heat searing her skin before it burned a massive scar into the wall behind her and to her right.

"Get the _WEERKU_ away from her." Zackel hissed, leaning on the doorway, the chains of ice extended from his staff. "You have some issue with me? THEN ME YOU GET!"

Another roar sounded from Grel'borg's lips as he turned around, the ice construct shattering in the process. The fireball he hurled at Zackel hit only stone as the mage dodged back into the doorway and then back out, firing a dagger of ice at the ogre's chest. The ogre deflected it with a gesture, even as Zackel followed up his attack with his own gesture, which happened to be considerably rude. A loud snort issued from the ogre, and he began to stalk towards the human mage.

If he noticed Rielle as she charged from behind, he gave no sign. He did not even respond when Rielle ran into the magical shield, the mana-based protection slamming into Rielle like a blow in and of itself and knocking her on her ass. She lay there a few seconds, stunned and hating herself for it. She'd dealt with such magic-shields before. Normally she just smashed right through them like they weren't there.

Not now. It seemed that whatever she could muster now just wasn't enough.

Zackel was on his own.

* * *

Zackel watched Rielle fall, and strongly debated going against his mind and going with his heart. But he knew that if he went back into that room, his odds of survival dropped far more then he could find acceptable. With his hand injured and his chance to use the healing potion on it gone (he had no idea where said potion had gotten off to: for all he knew some rat had carried it off), he needed every advantage he could get against his enemy, this ogre magi that had both finally revealed himself in person and as the one who had set all these events in motion, all because of some strange, inscrutable grudge against Zackel. Against an enemy like that, here, he had no advantage, and that just put Rielle in danger.

On the roof…

Another fireball flew at him: Zackel just managed to dodge, feeling hot slivers of stone pelt him from where it impacted on the wall. The ogre magi was still coming, still heading after him. Zackel just hoped that as smart as ogre magi were compared to their brethren, that said intelligence didn't cover certain tactics. Like not following an enemy into a place (such as the storm-hammered roof) they likely knew existed and likely could have suspected the enemy wanted them to be.

Then again, Zackel had done everything he could to wound Grel'borg's pride as much as his body. The mage had seen more than a few humans and other 'smarter' species do stupid things because of their ego. Surely ogres could be exploited the same way.

"I guess your first shot was the best you had to offer!" Zackel yelled, heading up the icy stairs. One advantage to being a frost mage specialist: you tended to get quite good at moving on slippery surfaces. So much so that when the ogre magi emerged through the doorway Zackel was able to turn on a dime and fire another frost bolt at him. This one, Grel'borg negated with his own fireball (and far more successfully then when Zackel had done the reverse earlier).

Zackel tried to pay it no mind, turning to resume running back up the stairs. He gave one last glance behind him to make sure the ogre magi was still pursuing him, and then sprinted the rest of the way up the stairs, disappearing through the open door and into the snow-swept roof beyond.

* * *

_I am under no delusion that anything has changed. But trouble has come, and it threatens my life._

_I am not your master. I likely never will be. I do not ask for your power. I am not so arrogant._

…_All I ask is for aid._

_Please help me._

_Please.

* * *

_

Slowly and carefully, Grel'borg made his way up after the mage, his mana shield going full bore in expectation for a trap. When nothing flew or exploded against him upon reaching the top of the stairs and its doorway, the ogre expressed mild surprise to himself. Said surprise did not slow his pace, the ogre magi stepping out into the howling gale.

A second later blue energy flashed behind him, and Grel'borg turned to see a thick wall of ice forming up in the doorway he'd just gone through.

"Would be rude if you tried to leave." Zackel said, standing on one of the roof top's barricades. He'd been given his answer, and with it he stepped/jumped off onto the main body of the path a moment later, his eyes locked onto the ogre magi. "So. What was that about me being undeserving?"

Grel'borg met the human mage's face, and then gave a low, dark chuckle.

The human thought it would have an edge here.

The human thought that keeping it here would protect the other.

The human was clueless, and Grel'borg planned to prove it. Its regret would make Grel'borg's triumph all the sweeter.

"Only that you remain." Grel'borg said, raising his staff. "Come, little man. Time to die."

* * *

Rielle lay where she had been tossed, but not because she couldn't get up. She could, and she was going to.

But she had to truly gather her strength. Her initial efforts may have been laughed off, but she hadn't had much in the way of preparation time. Maybe she was greatly worn down, a shell of her normal self…

But as much as she hated what that ogre magi had done, it had also served her. He'd gotten the blood pumping in her veins, feeding fresh adrenaline and rage to her body. He'd made a dear mistake in not managing to take her out when he'd had the chance. Soon she'd be back, and fighting mad, and the ogre would learn his folly in thinking she couldn't give a fight…

Then she heard the thundering footstep. Rielle jerked her head up.

Something was coming up the stairs. A second something. Unlike the ogre magi, which served to possess the ability to employ stealth, this second presence made no effort to hide its approach.

Rielle drew in a long, slow breath between her teeth, before rising to a semi-crouch position and crawling forward several steps before stopping. Waiting.

She had expected another ogre.

She did not expect the ogre to be so BIG, the monster barely managing to squeeze through the doorway. While Zackel likely would have recognized the ogre, covered in battered pieces of armor and wielding a club so huge he almost got it caught in the door, semi-ruining his intimidating entrance, Rielle did not. Even if she had, it likely wouldn't have made her care much.

Mug'thol looked at the Draenei, a cruel eagerness shining in his eyes.

"Ha. Ha ha." Mug'thol chortled. "Grel'borg still stupid. Not know good bits. Even with no metal. Why no metal, meat?"

"…and you are?" Rielle said, ignoring the question.

"ME MUG'THOL! STRONGEST OF CRUSHRIDGE! STRONGEST OF OGRES!" Mug'thol said, thumping a hand on his chest.

"How are you alive?" Rielle asked.

"You small food, use trick! Call down cold and pain! But I not stopped!" Mug'thol said. "White hide everything! Ogres forced to hide in building not our home! But I know where food is! What food stole!"

"Stole?" Rielle said.

"Steal home! Steal foodself!" Mug'thol said. "But I eat well! White hide everything, so dig! Make ogres dig and dig towards home! Dig to ignore cold, ignore hunger! Those that fall, become food! Dig and dig until home! Now home! NOW…Mug'thol eat. Eat well."

Rielle looked at the giant ogre another second before briefly closing her eyes. As far as she could tell, the ogre and some of the remains of his clan had taken shelter from Zackel's storm in one of the remaining Alterac structures that were dotted around the fortress. Unable to leave or get food due to Zackel's deadly blizzard, Mug'thol had ordered them to dig a path from their shelter to the fortress. How the fel the ogre had managed to actually dig in the correct direction and access the fortress was a mystery, but the fact of how Mug'Thol had made it here without his remaining 'troops' mutinying against him for being forced into intense labor and cannibalism was quite clear. Even robbed of his 'normal diet' for several weeks, the gargantuan ogre seethed with power and kill-lust.

There were other mysteries that remained, like exactly what the ogre magi who had come first had to do with any of this, and what, how, or even _if _the emergence of the pair had to do with all the strange happenings that had occurred to Rielle and Zackel that had not been explained by the ogres hiding in the basement (and what had happened to them, with their chief's return? Had they rejoiced, or fallen to his and his ogre's likely raging hunger?). But in truth, Rielle didn't really care.

She was a warrior, and she had just been presented with the greatest personal war she would ever fight.

And after all the excrement she'd been through, she would be damned, thrice or otherwise, if she ended _up _excrement.

Reaching out a hand, Rielle picked up her axe, which had been in front of where she'd crawled. She did not even bother glancing at her armor, the 'metal' that Mug'thol seemed disappointed she didn't have, lying in a corner in a neatly assembled pile. She could not get it on, and hence put it out of her mind. She had what she had, and she would make do.

Standing to her full height, Rielle looked the ogre in the eye.

"Just…so you know…I've had a real bad…last couple of days…" Rielle said, cracking her neck. "And it's put me…in one fel of a shitty mood."

The ogre just chuckled again. Rielle saw the muscles tightening under his armor, as the ogre prepared to storm forth and claim his meal. Rielle relaxed her own, as she slipped into a battle stance.

Time to go to war.

"Just your bad luck…to run into me."


	25. War Between The Roses: Headstrong

Chapter 25: Headstrong

_**Then.**_

_There was a reason that not many Draenei warriors trained with Melor._

_Some of it was simple circumstance: they ended up under the tutelage of Kore, or Ahonan, or one of the others. For the rest, the answer was simple when you saw Melor's face._

_There wasn't much left._

_Rielle did not know the exact circumstances of the battles her teacher had fought, but she didn't need them to know that he had to have survived some of the most atrocious of them. His facial tendrils were almost completely gone, only a few remaining on the right side of his face. The left side, as well as being devoid of the Draenei's traditional flesh-strands, almost seemed partially caved in (a trick of the light on the damaged flesh, Rielle had been told. His skull was supposedly all right, or at least sufficiently repaired), the eye long gone: Melor had replaced it with a magical jewel that supposedly compensated for the loss of his peripheral vision. The rest of the left side of his body was similarly ravaged: his left arm was notably smaller then the right one (nerve damage, Rielle had learned: despite the lesser size, Melor had supposedly compensated with greater training that made the arm equally as strong as his other, undamaged limb, a fact he'd used against more then a few cocky students), and he seemed to be more scar tissue than skin on the times Rielle had seen parts of his chest or legs. His back bore its own hideous scars, rumored to be from an atrocious fel curse that had caused malignant bone structures to sprout and rip through the flesh there. Indeed, from any angle you looked at, Melor's body spoke of the horrors of war._

_Not all could look at that, at what he had survived, and by extent, what could await them in their futures, and see beyond it to the skills and knowledge his torments had earned him. True, all the Draenei teachers of the physical arts bore their own scars, but none to the degree of Melor. And so, not many approached him._

_Melor did not really care. It was not a competition, to see who could gain the most or train the best recruits. The goal of the Draenei was to ensure their species' survival. Anything else paled in comparison._

_It was a give-no-shit attitude that Rielle had found herself appreciating more and more as she'd begun her studies under the Draenei warrior._

_It was this day, however, that she truly began to understand him._

_Rielle had arrived at their training area outside the Exodar to find it empty. A brief wandering had turned up neither her fellow students or her teacher. A little more exploring had rectified the latter._

_However, her teacher was in no condition to notice her. Mainly due to the fact he had been chained to an Elekk._

"_Are they of suitable firmness?" The Draenei male in front of Melor said, as the scarred Draenei fiddled with the manacle he had attached to his right wrist._

"_It seems to be." Melor said, holding out his arm and turning it a bit, looking at the shackle and the chain it was attached to. Similar restraints encased his other arm and both ankles on his legs: the chains lead to an Elekk that was positioned a small distance behind Melor. Said chains were attached to the Elekk's rear legs and tusks, another Draenei male sitting on the mount on top of the animal and petting it, the Elekk's eyes closed contently. "In any case, it will do."_

"_Teacher?" Rielle said. Melor turned his head towards the Draenei female, a bit of light glinting off the yellow gem set in his skull._

"_Rielle. What are you doing here?"_

"_I…came to train, teacher. As per our lessons."_

"_Training?" Melor said. "That is not for some time, Rielle."_

"…_But I…" Rielle said, investigating the parchment she'd shoved into her pocket, of the rough schedule Melor had given her when they'd started their training. Checking the date confirmed she had the right day…but not, as she'd thought, the right time. The writing had been slightly smeared, and Rielle had read the time wrong. She was over four hours early. "Oh. F-"_

"_Language." Melor said, raising a hand. "Well, since you are here, child, go over to the stationary constructs and run some extra drills. I have my own efforts to attend to for now."_

"_Yes sir." Rielle said, folding the parchment back up and walking over to the nearby wood, stone, and crystal dummies that she had trained on before. Picking up a two-handed mace, she warmed up for several minutes, loosening her muscles up and getting her blood flowing. Noise and yelling behind her indicated that her master had started whatever he'd been planning with the two Draenei and the Elekk, but having been given a task, Rielle paid it no mind._

_At first, anyway. After twenty minutes of swinging her stone mace at the training constructs, Rielle had finally gotten tired and bored enough to take a look. Dropping the mace and wiping her sweaty hair from her eyes, she turned to watch._

_It didn't take long for her eyes to widen, and stay that way._

_Whatever Melor had commanded the Elekk rider to do, it clearly did not involve staying still in any fashion. The Elekk roamed, twisted, and stomped around, dragging Melor by the chains he'd attached to himself. At the same time, Melor was facing down the other Draenei male, armed with the same stone training mace Rielle had been using. The other Draenei, however, was armed with a considerably more unpleasant weapon: a glowing blue staff that Draenei Vindicators occasionally used if they wanted to take a foe alive. The staff sent electrical blasts into whatever it struck, at strengths ranging from unpleasant to seizure-inducing (Rielle couldn't recall their official name, but their nickname was 'The Clench', due to the fact that getting zapped by one supposedly made your anus clench up so hard you'd need a muscle relaxant to get it back to normal). Normally, Melor would have never let his enemy get anywhere close to him with such a weapon, but with his body chained to a constantly-moving Elekk, his guard and stance was repeatedly disrupted, allowing his sparring partner to continually strike and jab him with the Clench staff. Despite his situation, Melor kept fighting, even after Rielle had thought, twice, that he was at risk at suffering a heart attack. Even when his sparring partner hesitated from the damage he seemed to be inflicted, Melor ordered him to continue, battling another seven minutes before he finally took a knee._

"_Enough." Melor said quietly, laying down his weapon. The Draenei bowed, and then said something Rielle couldn't hear. Melor nodded in response, and the Draenei scampered off._

"…_teacher?" Rielle said, approaching the badly battered Draenei. For a moment, Melor didn't response, feeling about his person before he produced a key._

"_To answer your question, no, I am not 'all right', but I will survive." Melor said, unlocking the cuffs. Even those small motions seemed labored, but Rielle kept her distance. "Are you done? I am afraid I do not have any other tasks I can think of, beyond more exercise."_

"_Teacher…"_

"_Yes?"_

"…_why the fel are you doing? Are you INSANE?" Rielle said. "I might be a student, but…how does that help you?"_

_Melor said nothing, regarding his female student as he sat on the ground._

"_I mean, maybe we…but…" Rielle said. ""I know that things won't always be in our favor, but…it just seems that…"_

"_Rielle." Melor said quietly. "I will teach you how to fight. But I can only take you so far. The same goes for any other trainer of our kind, or any kind. After that, you will have to teach yourself. And that, you will learn, is a lesson you will spend your whole life on. And it will be __**your **__lesson."_

_Rielle fell silent at her master's words, thinking them over._

"_There is no way to truly prepare for everything, my lady." Melor said, slowly standing up. "Only what you decide to prepare for. I would like to think that you can find method in my madness. If not…well, then that is how it goes."_

"…_I suppose." Rielle said. "I still question the validity of what I just saw."_

"_As well you should." Melor said, as his sparring partner returned with a healing potion. The warrior Draenei drank it gratefully, the magics within the liquid immediately going to work on the ugly burn marks that covered his body. "Because the day you stop asking questions is the day I fear for you."_

_Rielle nodded in response._

"_Now go run around the Exodar for taking such a disrespectful tone." Melor said, his voice now hard as a flint. "Three times. Toisil, keep pace!"_

"_Yes sir." Toisil said, brandishing the Clench staff at Rielle. "Move it young lady!"_

"_Wait how did-Gack!" Rielle said as the staff was thrust at her. Turning on her heels, she took off. Her first hope was that she could out-pace this Toisil._

_And when it turned out she couldn't, her second was that she really didn't hope anyone she knew saw her.

* * *

_

_**Now.**_

While Rielle hadn't exactly found what she'd seen or been told that day incomprehensible at the time, it had taken her longer to fully understand.

The world was the harshest teacher of all, and there was no guarantee you would survive its lessons. Your odds were only as great as you made them.

Perhaps that was how Melor had survived to teach her.

And it was how Rielle planned to survive this day. She'd been taught, and taught herself, how to fight in the best and the worst conditions. Maybe nothing quite like this…but nothing in life happened the way you wanted or expected.

Sometimes, you just made do.

Her body was weakened, but her mind was as sharp as ever. She could see the subtle shift in weight, the rippling of the muscles in the ogre's body as he brought back his club. The room was cramped, but not cramped enough that he couldn't still swing his weapon if he was in the right position. She could see his angle even as he calculated it himself. He was going to swing at a downward slant, planning to catch her if she ducked at the top of her head, knocking her senseless and leaving her open to his fists or feet.

So she didn't duck. She juked to the side and ducked, the club sweeping over her head. The ogre roared, the sound of rage crashing through the room. Rielle didn't let it affect her, as she swiftly closed in, twisting her axe in her hand as she rammed its pointed hilt against the side of Mug'thol's knee.

The ogre roared again, but Rielle knew her blow hadn't been as effective as she wanted. Despite the mish-mash nature of the armor Mug'thol wore, not to mention the wear and tear it likely suffered from, it had managed to work and keep her from doing more then inflicting a small flesh wound.

So Rielle went ahead and inflicted ANOTHER small flesh wound, and another, stabbing at Mug'thol's knee again and again. The ogre swept around, trying to smash Rielle with his club, but the Draenei went with the motion and matched Mug'thol's turn with her own. She managed to get in six or seven stabs before she was forced to break away, ducking again as the club smashed into the wall. Surging back up, she saw the ogre twist towards her, his open hand grasping for her head.

It found her axe-head instead, as she twirled the weapon back up and thrust the blade out. Mug'thol yelled and jerked his hand away. Rielle went after the limb, twisting her axe again.

Her first mistake. Focused on the appendage and doing damage to it, she erroneously calculated that Mug'thol would try and bring the club back around to strike her in the back. He didn't. Instead, he dropped the club and swung out with his faster fist. Rielle was too slow to dodge, the giant knuckles ramming into her back and sending her crashing against the opposite wall, the Draenei only partially able to deflect the impact as she fell to one knee.

Mug'thol bellowed laughter at the sudden turnaround, even as Rielle felt nausea and weakness slam into her body. She'd fought less then thirty seconds and it felt ten times that long.  
"Come here meat!" Mug'thol said, yanking up his club. With his left hand. Rielle was able to tell, with a quick glance, that said hand did not seem weaker then his right one. The damn ogre was ambidextrous. Figured.

She also knew even before his other, right hand started heading for the base of the weapon what the ogre was going to do: a two-handed roundhouse swing.

Rielle figured the ogre expected her to duck again. Instead, she willed power and strength to her muscles, standing fully to her feet.

Mug'thol swung his club.

Rielle met it with her own swing.

The impact rang through her arms, down her back, and all the way down her legs, a thousand tiny blows, but Mug'thol had clearly not anticipated the strength she possessed, even dilapidated, in her small (to him) frame. The block, however, was successful, the club deflected away from the ogre's body, and Rielle charged in, spinning herself.

The axe blade bit deep into the ogre's stomach.

But not deep enough, again. Rielle had used up too much of her lessened strength setting the strike up: she hadn't managed to fully cut through Mug'thol's armor. Worse, the ogre's recoil caused her weapon to be twisted out of her hands, trapped in the filthy metal as Mug'throl swung his free fist at her.

Rielle went low and surged forward, diving between the ogre's legs, his fist just missing her right hoof.

"RARGH, STAND STILL!" Mug'thol yelled. Had she been in a better state, Rielle might have sarcastically asked if that exclamation had EVER worked.

Instead, she twisted on her heels, dug deep for more strength, and thrust her hand forward into a palm strike, hitting Mug'thol in his right ankle as hard as she could. The ogre jerked from the strike, snarling and trying to turn around.

Which is what Rielle had wanted, immediately throwing herself on her back and lashing out with both her hooves, slamming them into the side of Mug'thol's left knee. She was certain she heard or felt something give, but all she _knew _was that her attack made Mug'thol lose his balance, even as she frantically rolled onto her stomach and tried to lunge out from beneath him.

She again made it, barely, the ogre crashing down behind her. It was probably fortunate that a wave of dizziness picked _that _time to come visit her in her head, stealing her sense of the situation as she fought to stay conscious. After a few seconds she beat it back, pushing herself back to her feet.

Her second mistake, so to speak. Her brief spell had kept her from retrieving her axe and furthering her attack, but she couldn't have predicted that. Said error had come from her not properly judging the ogre's reach.

Giant, vice-like fingers seized on her legs, yanking her backwards. Rielle immediately began struggling, but her efforts weren't enough as she was jerked up into the air, dangling upside down as Mug'thol pushed himself back up. With a chortle, he pulled the axe out of his stomach armor plate and dropped it.

"Now make good!" Mug'thol said, reaching for his club. Rielle knew full well that if he swung it into her while she was in her current position, he'd break her in half. Worse, she didn't have her knife: it had been put aside sometime during her illness and she didn't know where it was.

She didn't need it, instead rearing up and digging her nails as hard as she could into Mug'thol's hand, using the leverage to pull herself up and scour said nails as deep into the flesh as she could manage, even as she sank her teeth into Mug'thol's lower finger. The ogre roared at the sudden pain, but he didn't drop the Draenei.

Instead, he threw her. Rielle managed to complete a partial tumble before she smashed back and hip first into the wall opposite the fireplace. The impact against the floor was almost as unpleasant, searing pain and clutching dark fighting in Rielle's mind for dominance.

The pain won out, and brought with it sense. Rielle did a half-second check to see if she'd broken anything. When her self-diagnosis came back negative, she pushed herself up, rising up to her feet.

Just in time for Mug'thol to throw her axe at her.

Rielle jerked to the side, the blade of the weapon impaling into the wall. She glanced sideways, assessing with some gratitude that the move had been a reaction to her hand assault rather than a proper combat move, before turning her gaze to Mug'thol, trying to batter down the pain and weariness.

"You WILL be meal!" Mug'thol said, grabbing up his club. "Eat your guts, your bones, your face!"

"You know…this isn't exactly a fair fight." Rielle said, reaching up and yanking her axe free. "Maybe I should close my eyes?"

Mug'thol's only response was to charge and piston his club towards the Draenei like a battering ram. Rielle reared up her weapon to meet it.

Then ducked at the last second, causing Mug'thol to draw up in confusion, having been expecting a weapons-meeting. Said confusion was long enough for Rielle to crab-sprint under the club and reach the underside of the ogre's arm, where she slashed her axe up and sliced a wound into the flesh open in an exposed spot on Mug'thol's patchwork armor. The ogre thundered his pain and tried to crush Rielle under his club, and when she moved away and to her current left, tried to swing it into her.

His club hit the wall first, having been too close to said wall: Mug'thol's awareness of his surroundings was considerably less than Rielle's. In the time allotted by the ogre's wasted blow, Rielle had darted around Mug'thol's form and lashed out with her axe, opening another wound on the ogre's side. With another yell, Mug'thol swung his club around in a deadly spin, only for Rielle to duck and slash him across the back, carving open another wound.

The ogre surprised her then, as it lunged backwards instead of trying to turn, Mug'thol moving to crush her up against the wall. He wasn't fast enough; the Draenei got her axe up and braced against the ogre before he'd crossed the distance, the ogre ramming the point of the head into his own body. Lamenting his pain, Mug'thol stumbled forward; Rielle yanked her axe free and went after him, reaching him before he could turn to face her and going low, sliding between the ogre's legs and slashing her axe up into his stomach when she had reached his front.

The move didn't pay off, as the armor took the shot again. Worse, Mug'thol reacted before Rielle could follow up, slamming the club down lengthwise across the Draenei. Rielle just managed to get her weapon between her and the wood, but she still felt like she'd been partially hammered into the floor, her tortured muscles screaming at her to stop her torment of them.

Mug'thol, however, had his own torments, which is what Rielle had gone for. While the injuries she'd inflicted were superficial, they likely burned with pain, screwing up what little battle-intelligence the ogre had. Instead of grabbing at her, or kicking her, Mug'thol continued to press down on the club, trying to squeeze her into mush. And while Rielle was in a bad state, it wasn't anything she couldn't get out of.

And she did, shifting her body to the side just enough to get out from under the club, the wood slamming her axe into the ground. The abrupt cessation of a counter-force caused the ogre to lose his balance, falling forward slightly and down to one knee.

Rielle slashed her leg up and kicked the ogre in the face as hard as she could. She felt his nose break beneath her hoof, even as the ogre squealed and reared back in turn, falling on his rear. Having no time to retrieve her axe, Rielle instead leapt up and lunged forward, trying to grab onto the ogre's upper half and take out his eyes.

Her defensive reading only let her block the ogre's fist instead of dodge it, the blow knocking her away. Unfortunately, her sense of balance decided that taking direct blows in its current state was a no-no, and her dizziness allowed Mug'thol to grab up his club and swing it out, further knocking Rielle away before her feet tangled up and she fell onto her side.

Too long. She couldn't dally any more. She had to end this, before her body gave out.

Mug'thol had regained his feet just in time for Rielle to charge back in, having picked up her axe in mid-run. Her strike slashed another wound onto Mug'thol's leg before Rielle turned and took the ogre's punch on her back, stumbling forward. Mug'thol took the bait and lashed out with the club: Rielle ducked and scrambled around the ogre's side again. The ogre twisted to catch her, only to overshoot Rielle when she immediately reversed direction and ducked under the club again, getting around Mug'thol's side and sending her axe to bite deeply into the ogre's knee. Mug'thol shrieked, but the wound wasn't great (again) and Rielle knew it, the Draenei wrenching the axe out just in time to escape Mug'thol's club once more. She feinted that she was going through his legs once more before twisting away and running around the ogre. Mug'thol snarled in alarmed rage, trying to guess and counter her intent, and failing, as she didn't strike for his blind side, instead continuing to run. The two whirled around each other a few times before Mug'thol lost his temper and just began spinning around with his club.

Rielle won the game of 'tag' after two desperate dodges caused the club to strike the wall, and she made full use of it as she brought her axe down on the ogre's current weapon-hand. Mug'thol shrieked in pain once more, the club tumbling from his fingers. Rielle yanked the axe free and gathered what strength she had, going for the kill as she leapt up and aimed for Mug'thol's neck.

Her last mistake. Rielle had planned for Mug'thol's other hand to come for her, and could have deflected it and still lashed out.

She had not expected him to recover his other hand so quickly. Perhaps in all her twirling about, she'd also confused herself a bit.

The hands closed on her, trapping her arms at her sides. Three strikes, you're out.

With a snarling roar, Mug'thol smashed Rielle into the ground as hard as he could. Rielle felt the air leave her body even as the staggering pain tore through it. Despite it all, she tried to hold onto her weapon, get in a swing…

Which ended as soon as Mug'thol whirled around and smashed Rielle face-first into the wall behind him, caving a small crater in. Yanking the Draenei out, Mug'thol smashed Rielle into the rock floor again, her axe spiraling away before the ogre yanked the warrior up and, with one final bellow, hurled her across the room.

She crashed directly into the fireplace, wrecking the top portion before she came down onto the glowing embers below in a shower of sparks. The Draenei spasmed once, and then lay still.

Mug'thol grunted, wiping at his bleeding face, his teeth grit fiercely at the injuries covering his body. Despite it all, dark satisfaction had begun welling in his breast. A hard meal, but one that would taste all the sweeter for it. Fel, from the hissing noise Mug'thol heard, it had already begun to cook.

"Not strong." Mug'thol said. "Like all others. I strongest. You not."

The ogre's continued satisfaction lasted another six seconds.

Then Rielle began to move.

"…huhn?" Mug'thol said, as the Draenei rose up, small pieces of stone and soot falling off her body as she did. Drops of blood fell and boiled away on the dully-glowing embers that lay beneath Rielle's feet, the hot stones having seared some ugly burns on her lithe form.

Rielle wasn't aware of them. She wasn't aware of the multiple cracked ribs she had, or the dislocated elbow she'd popped back into place as an afterthought as she'd gotten up. Something bigger had broken within her, and for the moment it held no concept of pain, limits, or surrender.

The beast within her had slipped its chains. It no longer sought to follow directions or commands, nor serve any desires but it's own. It had been too long since it had fed.

And if it had to, it would gladly destroy its host to sate its appetite.

Strangely, one of the few things Rielle realized was that one of her horns had broken off. She only noticed a few seconds before she mostly went away again. Her fingers touched the blood pooling down from her nose and mouth, feeling its hot wetness before she traced it across the rest of her face.

"…all right then." Rielle said, her eyes blazing like a star. "Now…_I'm…__**really…ANGRY!"**_


	26. War Between The Roses: Mercury Rising

Chapter 26: Mercury Rising

_**Then.**_

_Zackel didn't know what business the Maginor had with SI:7, but he'd long figured out that as the student, it wasn't his job to ask questions. Especially considering he was the new student (among others, yes, but he was the one who had been given this current task), at that. So, when he'd woken up and found the parchment on his studying materials, along with the note that said to bring it to the stone building tucked into Stormwind's Old Town, the only thing Zackel had done was confirm that it had been the Maginor who had actually sent him the request. Two magic words confirmed the secret signature the wizard had placed in the treated wax he used, and so Zackel had gotten dressed, eaten a quick breakfast, and headed out to deliver the message before classes started._

_Had things gone differently, he might have mentioned where he was going to Daldion, or one of his fellow students in passing. As things had went, he didn't, and hence had headed to the SI:7 headquarters alone._

_A fact that had begun to bother him when he entered its courtyard and found it deserted. True, it was fairly early in the morning, but Zackel expected to see SOMEONE in the well-used training area. That was not the case, and Zackel found himself glancing around as he walked across the area. He had a bad feeling._

_Which only increased as he reached the front of the building and found the doors closed and, as he tried to turn the door handle, locked. The young mage-in-training narrowed his eyes, glancing back over his shoulders to confirm that he was still alone._

"_Um, hello?" Zackel said. "Anyone there?"_

_There was no answer. Zackel's attempt to turn up a mail slot or something in that vein revealed nothing. Zackel cocked his head at the issue, letting go of his trainer's staff to run a hand through his brown hair. He had never cared for yelling at a doorway in an attempt to gain entry: it always struck him as crass. At the moment, though, he didn't see what else he could do. Well, besides come back later, but that was the last option._

"_Hello! Anyone there!" Zackel said, raising his hand and knocking on the door. "I have a message…!"_

_The dagger buried itself in the wood scant inches from Zackel's hand. Zackel stared at the weapon for a few seconds before his alarm overrode his surprise and he turned around._

_Nothing. The area was still deserted._

_Zackel, however, was not so stupid in the ways of SI:7 to expect that was actually the case. He promptly did the smart thing: snatching up his training staff and running for it._

_He made it down the stairs and a third of the way across the courtyard before the boot tripped him, Zackel immediately losing his balance and falling on his face._

"_Ha. Nice try." The female voice said, the stealth cloak falling off the black-clad rogue as she spoke._

"_What wait…?" Zackel said, mixing his words up in his shock. He'd rolled onto his rear as the rogue had spoken, his staff nearby._

"_Just business kid. Sorry." The rogue said, pulling a pair of nastily curved daggers from her waist. "Bye."_

_The rogue lunged forward. Zackel screamed and waved his arms defensively._

_The ice surged out of his hands and smashed into the rogue's chest, knocking her backwards. She turned the blow into a cartwheel and then a flip before stopping, holding her chest as she looked at the young man with dark annoyance._

_Zackel scrambled up, his mind tumbling over itself in his confusion. He didn't know whether to continue running, yell his head off for help, or try and defend himself. Maybe all three…_

_Oh light, where was his staff? And what was…_

"_Enough." Another voice suddenly said, before a second stealth cloak dropped, revealing a male dwarf._

"_Ahhhhh!"_

"_Relax lad! On your side." The dwarf said. "Sorry for the deception. It was what we were told to do."_

"…_huh?" Zackel said, his head jerking back and forth between the pair. The female rogue had put her daggers away and was massaging the area where Zackel had struck her, pulling her mask off with the other hand._

"_Just look inside the parchment you were given. That will answer it." The dwarf said, before turning to the female. "Yae all right lass?"_

"_Yeah. Ugh. Got a kick like a mule." The female rogue said._

"_Yae left yerself open, lass. Underestimated the young man. Never good." The dwarf said, apparently the female's teacher. The two turned and began wandering off, leaving a very confused Zackel standing._

_Eventually, he managed to get the parchment he'd been given (and dropped when he'd been running), opening it up. The message within was short and simple, and Zackel looked up at the windows around him before turning towards the SI:7 entrance that the dwarf and human had gone through, the lock now undone._

_The symbol traced on the paper allowed Zackel past the security and to the upstairs level where the room he'd been instructed to go was. The Maginor was sitting at a chair inside it, near the window, rifling through a book._

"_Maginor?"_

"_Yes Zackel. Come in." Maginor Dumas said, not looking up from the books he was examining. "Please don't dally."_

"_Uh…sir?" Zackel said as he walked over to his magic instructor. "What just happened?"_

"_The unfortunate state of teaching in these troubled times." Dumas said, finally looking up. "You remember what you just did?"_

"_You mean out there? I, well…panicked. Lashed out blindly."_

"_And you did so with ice. That's what I needed to see." Dumas said, closing the book he'd been checking._

"…_you were trying to see what I'd do under sudden danger?" Zackel said. "But I told you that story when I was younger, wasn't it…?"_

"_Not precisely. What happened there was your initial awakening. I needed to see what you would do, or what would happen, once you'd gotten the bare basics of training. To decide what direction likely best suits you. And it seems to be the path of frost." Dumas said. 'I apologize for the methods I utilized to decide this. In older, calmer times, those that were training in the art could discover their specialty at their own pace. We don't have that luxury any more. The sooner we know it, the better, and tactics like this are often the best way to get a handle on your own unique spirit."_

"_So…that's it? I'm a frost mage now?"_

"_Not necessarily. You can't really decide these things with one test. But it is likely where your skills will lie. Now that we now, we can continue lessons to see if this is true, or find what the truth is otherwise. I have some books for you." Dumas said, offering Zackel the tome he'd been perusing as well as two more by his side. Zackel took them, tucking them under his arm. "Begin reading them and attempting their lessons immediately."_

"…_yes sir." Zackel said, still a bit off-put by it all._

"_And don't tell anyone else about this. I still have to give this test to several of your peers. I don't want to muddy the waters." Dumas said, standing up and reaching out a hand. "Hold still now. We're going to return to the school for today's lessons."_

"_Yes sir." Zackel said again. "Uh sir…are there going to be any more lessons in this vein?"_

"_You won't know until you face them." Dumas said, and with a flash of light, the two were gone, having blinked across the city.

* * *

_

_**Now.**_

The Maginor had been more right than he'd realized. Even after Zackel had left his teaching, there had been more lessons in that vein. Lessons in that vein were life.

The test had also been correct in assessing Zackel's talents in the art of ice and cold, though it would not be for some time and great tragedy later that Zackel really understood why that was. And, just now, within the fortress he now stood on, Zackel had learned still more about it, and himself.

He wasn't about to stop his lessons. Especially when he didn't even know why. This ogre magi, Grel'borg the Miser, spoke as if he had some sort of grudge against him. Just what it was part of the many questions Zackel had had since the thudding noise had woken him up.

If he was anywhere near as good as he'd strove to be, he'd get answers. If not…

He hadn't struggled to cast off life's burdens these weeks to have it taken away from him. By that accord, he took the first shot.

"_SONTAR!"_

The blade of ice flew from Zackel's staff. It would have stopped a charging, unarmored Tauren in its tracks.

With a gesture, Grel'borg batted it aside, his will reaching out and turning away Zackel's.

"_SONTAR! SONTAR!"_ Zackel yelled, firing several more blasts. They all suffered the same fate, Grel'borg barely seeming to make an effort. Clutching his staff tighter, Zackel raised it to the sky.

"_SONTAR-HA!"_

The storm contorted above Grel'borg and then rained bladed, crushing down ice on him. The ogre magi raised his own staff in response, and the ice deflected to the rooftop around him. When all was said and done, he remained untouched.

"…is that all?" Grel'borg said, lowing his staff even as he raised a hand. "If so…"

The ogre thrust his hand out, a fireball erupting from his palm and hurling towards Zackel. It was Zackel's turn to 'counter-spell', lashing out with his staff and knocking the fireball away.

Unfortunately, it came back. Zackel yelped and barely dodged, the heat searing his face as the bolt of flame surged by. It immediately turned back around and went for Zackel again. Zackel frantically deflected it once more, and again, only for the flame to keep homing back in.

The last time, Zackel blasted it outright with ice, finally getting a bead on it and snuffing it out. Zackel took no satisfaction in the action though. He knew what was coming, and immediately turned his attention back to Grel'borg to face it.

He'd been wrong. He didn't know what was coming. He'd expected two fireballs.

Grel'borg, having stood there channeling, instead slammed out both his hands and proceeded to fire off a stream of several dozen.

Zackel went into a defensive frenzy, trying to knock away all the smaller, weaker, but still lethal attacks. The assault was too much despite his attempts, and the small blasts impacted on his chest, shoulder, and left leg. Zackel stumbled backwards, briefly regaining his balance before falling to one knee. He deflected the last two fireballs, somehow, with magic willed through his broken hand.

Sixteen more followed in their wake.

Zackel responded by slamming his staff into the ground. A wall of ice erupted between him and Grel'borg, the fireballs impacting on it instead. Zackel pushed himself up, drawing back to shove the ice wall forward.

Grel'borg moved first, spinning his staff around and stabbing it towards Zackel. The fire that erupted from his staff end lanced out far swifter and with more impact then his initially thrown projectiles, the scorching attack drilling right through the ice wall like it wasn't there and through Zackel in turn. Zackel recoiled away, waiting for the pain to start, and, after it didn't, checking the left side of his robes. A large hole had been burnt clean through the magical protection, the material flapping in the wind having obscured Zackel as a target and just left him with some blistered skin.

Then Grel'borg shattered the ice wall with a follow-up fireball, the chunks of frozen water pelting Zackel and knocking him down. Pain exploded through his arm as he banged his injured hand, a low shudder shaking Zackel's body as he tried to deal with it.

"Others have come like you." Grel'borg said, walking forward from where he'd been. "Assuming themselves better. They fed my belly, as you will."

"…I don't suppose that I never made any assumption will change anything." Zackel said.

"No."

"Figured." Zackel said, before he seized the cold wind that continued to scream around him and used it to push himself to his feet, his staff's tip glowing as he lashed out. Grel'borg showed surprising speed by dodging to the side, the blue energy missing him. Instead, it struck the ice barricade Zackel had thrown over the door, flashing out and forming into a mass of cruel ice-spikes.

Zackel promptly followed up the first blast with a second, more power exploding from his staff and forming into a horizontal pillar of ice. It slammed into the ogre magi, driving him backwards across the roof and towards the spikes.

For several feet, before he began to slow down. Zackel grimaced and placed his broken hand on his staff, but it didn't help as the ogre stopped completely. Rasping air between his teeth, Zackel dropped off the effort, leaving the ice battering ram floating in the air.

Grel'borg glanced behind himself, looking at the spikes, before turning and smashing the ice ram down into the ground, shattering it to pieces.

"Pathetic." Grel'borg said, gesturing behind himself, a bloom of fire melting the spikes Zackel had formed. "Child would have avoided that."

"You'd be surprised." Zackel said, before slashing back his staff. The broken ice on the ground flew to him and reformed on Zackel's weapon, the mage swinging it back like a morning star.

It shattered on Grel'borg's magical shield, but Zackel followed up the attack with another burst of blue energy. Grel'borg moved to dodge it, only for Zackel to blink out of sight, the mage teleporting behind the ogre. As he did, his blast went low, striking the ground in front of Grel'borg and manifesting into more vicious spikes. Zackel followed the attack up in turn as he re-appeared behind Grel'borg, spinning and firing another fist of ice.

It might have worked if Grel'borg hadn't immediately copied Zackel and blinked forward himself, no longer standing in front of the ice spikes. Having turned around as well, he immediately blasted Zackel's ice-fist with his own fire, blowing the attack apart. Zackel snarled and raised his staff, only for Grel'borg to shoot another fireball, this one in an arc. By the time Zackel realized the fact of the arc, the fireball had flown over and detonated behind, throwing him forward.

Directly onto his own trap.

The tips of the spikes dulled half a second from a frantically sent command before Zackel crashed onto them. The lengths of dense ice still crushed the air from his body, Zackel gasping it out in a large cloud of white that the wind immediately stole away.

"You believe you were stronger. Up here." Grel'borg said, gesturing around at the storm. Said storm didn't seem to be bothering him at all: he didn't even have any residual ice on him. "I ogre. I am strong, and I live here. You think magic belongs only to you. You believe any of it I could use is below your concern."

Zackel slowly pushed himself up, breathing with considerable pain as he looked at his enemy.

"Your error will make you scream." Grel'borg said, taking his staff in his hands. Even with the storm, Zackel could feel the heat gathering on him.

"Personally I'd rather keep my words soft and sweet." Zackel said, holding out his injured hand. He wished he could do this with his staff or left hand, but he needed said staff in said hand to make guarding efforts when it was needed. Zackel worked with what he had: ice surged up around his right hand, and he hurled the sphere he'd formed at Grel'borg's head.

Grel'borg, amazingly, took it, the ball smashing against his skull and breaking apart. It made him take a step back, but the ogre kept his focus. Alarm surged into Zackel's heart, and he promptly tried the same trick again, this time making the ball three times bigger.

A mistake, as a surge of pain erupted up his hand in the process. Losing control, Zackel dropped the ball instead of throwing it, drawing his aching hand close to his body on instinct with a groan.

"Damn it." Zackel said, before looking up at the ogre. "I'm not hungry."

"_CHIRECK!"_ Grel'borg thundered, thrusting his staff up before twisting and pointing it at Zackel. Zackel brought up his staff to mount a defense.

When no immediate attack came, Zackel almost lowered it entirely in confusion.

Then he felt the heat above him and looked up.

The twisting pillar of fire smashed down almost on top of his head, Zackel stepping backwards just in time. He retreated several more steps before the fire pillar roared after him, faster then he could move.

"_Sont…!"_ Zackel managed to get out, and then the fire was on him, the mage vanishing from sight.

Grel'borg lowered his staff, the fire twister quickly breaking apart and fading away. The ogre placed one hand on his chest as he looked at where his enemy had been, his gaze glancing downward for a few moments.

"Do you not see?" Grel'borg said. "Is this not finally…proof enough…?"

The ogre stopped talking as the partially shattered ice block was revealed. A few seconds later it fully broke apart, Zackel pushing his way out from within it.

"…why are we doing this?" Zackel said.

"You…"

"Yeah yeah! I'm not worthy! Whatever the fel that means! And you're not explaining!" Zackel said, icy blue power erupting anew from his staff and surging around his body. Despite his best efforts, all the bad circumstances had finally gotten to him, and he'd lost his temper. "I really don't care any more! Mostly because I just realized I've nearly died three times in less than two minutes, and I DON'T HAVE THE SLIGHTEST CLUE WHY!"

"…and what you plan to do about it?" Grel'borg said.

"LET'S FIND OUT." Zackel said, and slammed the end of his staff down on the ground. Blue light flashed, and then ice blades began erupting across the rooftop floor towards the ogre magi.

Grel'borg snorted and rammed his own staff down. Eruptions of fire blasted up from beneath the encroaching ice, shattering it to pieces and stopping its advance.

"Rage does not suit you, manling." Grel'borg said. Zackel's only response was to spin his staff and thrust it out, firing blast after blast of blue energy at the ogre. Grel'borg deflected them all again, sending the manifestations of cold shooting off in all directions, the attacks instead impacting all around the roof, several outright falling off the edge and vanishing into the swirling clouds of snow down there.

"I know anger. Far better than you. And yours will not grant you advantage!" Grel'borg said. Zackel lowered his arms, breathing heavily.

Keeping his eyes locked with Grel'borg.

Hoping the ogre didn't see how the impact sites of his deflected power had manifested several more masses of spikes, all of them aimed at the ogre.

With one swift upward jerk of his hand, Zackel broke them off and lanced them at the ogre.

Who slammed his staff down with a roar, and terrible heat erupted off his body, the fire consuming all the ice and melting it away before it got close. The fire was so intense it actually melted all the snow around Grel'borg in a ten foot radius, and almost seemed to give the storm roaring around him pause, if just for a second.

Weariness and despair settled on Zackel's mind, even as he fell to one knee.

"I grant no pity for your crippled state. You choose fight anyway." Grel'borg said. "It not mean much difference. You waste power, rely too much on fancy and tricks. You have little left. Give up. Kill you rather painlessly."

"…you know…a little while ago…I might have actually been tempted by that offer." Zackel said.

Dull purple energy erupted on Zackel's form, Zackel closing his eyes and drawing on his lessons of the arcane. Azeroth, as much pain as it had brought it, was blessed with truly abundant magical energy, and Zackel knew how to draw on it when his own stores were depleted. Grel'borg watched as the mage channeled the evocation for several seconds, the energies fading away as Zackel stood up.

"It matters little." Grel'borg said. "I still stronger. You see regardless."

"Maybe you're right. Maybe you are stronger. And maybe anger doesn't suit me." Zackel said, reaching into his robe with his injured hand. "Personally…I'm more of a gamesman. Play Thrust?"

Grel'borg stared at the mage, who withdrew a small white feather clutched between his finger tips.

"Didn't think so." Zackel said. "The point being, I'm good at lateral thinking."

The feather dissolved, as Zackel took a deep breath.

Then he leapt up, calling on the cold winds to embrace him again. Whether they obeyed or were merely kind, they listened, as Zackel was swept up by the cataract and 'flew' off to the side, vanishing into the swirling white oblivion.

"…rarngh." Grel'borg snarled, turning in the direction Zackel had vanished. "Stupid trickery! Return and fight!"

The storm had no answered save its ever-repeating howl.

"…you think up here, she…" Grel'borg began.

The ice spear flew from the blinding snow, impaling itself into Grel'borg's shoulder. The ogre magi yelled, but the wound wasn't deep and the ogre quickly grabbed and yanked the point out. The second spear missed Grel'borg by a foot, and the ogre turned and counter-attacked, throwing blasts of flame into the storm.

"You cannot use trick forever!" Grel'borg said. The only response was another blast of ice from a completely different angle that torn into Grel'borg's back. Snarling, the ogre turned around, and then immediately turned again and blasted the follow-up ice spear, destroying it before it could strike him in the back a second time. The ice spear after that came from the side: Grel'borg managed to dodge it.

The forth one came down as he did, impaling itself in Grel'borg's leg. The ogre bellowed again, even as a shadow materialized before him.

Grel'borg lanced out his staff and fired a flaming bolt directly at the form as it flew forward.

The rough ice construct crashed down at Grel'borg's feet, broken to pieces by the attack. A second later, Zackel came in from an angle, a sword of ice on his staff that he stabbed directly at Grel'borg neck.

He found the ogre's hand instead, the ogre magi slapping Zackel's staff away and thrusting forward. Zackel's eyes went as wide as saucers. How…?

"RARGGGHHHHH!" Grel'borg yelled, as he turned and slammed Zackel into the rooftop. Caught off guard by the ogre's amazing defense, Zackel barely managed to manifest some ice armor.

It didn't help. The impact felt like it broke every single remaining bone in Zackel's body, the crushing slam reverberating back through Zackel's form several times over before it faded and Zackel lay still.

Zackel opened his mouth to try and breathe. Blood flowed out instead, called up from within Zackel. Grel'borg snorted and took a step back, looking at the crumpled remains of the mage with disgust.

"Fool. You still think better? That this superior?" Grel'borg said, gesturing at the never-ending blizzard. "I MASTER of fire! All fire! Storm cannot harm me! You tricks cannot fool me! See own fire in you!"

Zackel's mind was far too scrambled to find sense in Grel'borg's words. Had he not been a writhing mess at the ogre's feet, he might have (correctly) concluded that the ogre's magical skills included the ability to see or sense heat. Including body heat. Zackel could do something similar, but only to a mild degree: the ogre apparently had far greater proficiency. His sneak attack had been a failure even as he'd started it: the ogre had always known where he was and had acted otherwise to lure him in.

"Have seen enough."

The giant hand reached down, seizing Zackel and pulling him up. Zackel tried to resist, to mount another offensive.

Then he felt the heat building on him, and his dulled eyes went wide and clear.

"Set fire FREE."

Everything ignited on Zackel's body. His robes. His skin. His hair. Zackel felt the cruel claws of the flame surge down his mouth and impale its claws through his heart, even as it stole away the air he would have needed to scream.

"_**BURN."**_ Grel'borg said.

And Zackel did.


	27. War Between The Roses: Savage By Nature

Chapter 27: Savage By Nature

_**Then.**_

_To the Draenei species, Azuremyst Isle was a mixed blessing. After years of hiding in the corners of Draenor, the lush planet of Azeroth was a wondrous change…but the process of arriving there had come with a cost. The violent crash of the Exodar had caused its unique design and aspects to rain down on the island and the adjacent Bloodmyst Isle, and the potent and unnatural energies of the pieces had not had a good effect on what was considered the 'normal process' of Azeroth life. Animals, plants, land, and water had been touched and changed by the Exodar pieces, poisoning and warping them more often than not. The Draenei had immediately begun to try and reverse the inadvertent damage they had caused, but their numbers had been stretched thin by the many tasks that required their attention, and the process was slower than some would have liked. Due to the slow progress, certain rules had been laid down. _

_One of the stronger ones was to stay inside when it rained. The Draenei were still not certain if the Exodar-contamination had extended to the clouds, and had issued a general order to seek shelter until further notice._

_It had been raining that day, but Rielle hadn't cared. She'd been about as beyond caring as she could have been as she stumbled out into the pouring water, having had no real idea of a direction and not really wanting one. All she could think about was what she had been told._

_How terribly she'd been betrayed._

_Her sister had heard the wind. She was one of the new breed of warrior, the shaman. Rielle had smiled to her sister's face; part of her had even meant it. But when she'd gotten away, the other side of the blade had begun to emerge._

_She was alone. She'd waited so long for the Light to come to her. She'd even begun basic training in combat, hunting for her epiphany…and found only silence. And now, with Ishova finding her calling, Rielle had pushed herself to do something she'd never had the courage, and the gall, to do._

_She could still feel the faint echoes of the unique impression O'ros had made on her when he'd spoken. When she'd taken a knee, almost prostrated herself before him, and asked him what she had to do to find the power within her._

_He'd told her the truth. He'd told her that no matter what she did, the Light had not chosen to bless her, nor would magic. It was not her destiny. In his revelation, he had tried to comfort her._

_The pain had been too much. She'd fled from his reason, his genuine care. She didn't want it. It wasn't with the Naaru that Rielle had always felt out of place with. And there was nothing the Naaru could do about why, not without drastically changing what had made them choose her people to bestow their blessings upon._

_The water had long soaked her to the skin when she finally tripped and fell. Instead of getting up, she lay on her knees for a few moments before she began to scream._

_Alone in the storm, no one heard her. Rielle shrieked wordless cries as she clawed at the dirt, a gibberish mess of pain and rage and betrayal. She screamed even though she knew that no answer would be provided by it, and definitely not the one she wanted, or maybe even needed._

_She screamed until the other voice finally spoke._

"_That's a waste of good anger."_

_Rielle jerked her head towards the voice, looking at the male Draenei covered in dark water-leathers, his head partially covered by a cloak. Seeing his protection, Rielle dimly became aware of how she probably looked, soaked and filthy, her hair undone and partially covering her eyes, but the far larger part of her could give any kind of damn or blessing how she looked. What did it matter? She was barren, empty._

_A failure._

"_Especially when it may put your life at risk." The Draenei said, reaching out a hand. "Let's get back inside."_

"_Leave me alone." Rielle spat._

"_That wasn't a request young lad-"_

"_I SAID GO AWAY!" Rielle yelled, surging up and swinging her fist at the Draenei. The Draenei moved out of the way, catching Rielle's fist and twisting behind her, yanking her arm up behind her back._

"_Our species has lost enough to worthy causes, child. I won't stand by and risk another loss for such a pointless one!" The Draenei said. Rielle's only response was to contort her body, using her rain-slick form to slip her wrist free and whirl around. She tackled the Draenei, pushing him down into the dirt before she started raining down fists._

_She'd thrown several before her struggles finally threw the Draenei's cloak off, exposing his horrifically scarred face and missing eye. The sight of the wound finally caused Rielle to freeze up, which was all the time the Draenei needed to reach up with his leg and hook it around Rielle, yanking her off him and driving her into the ground._

"_Are you in control now?" The Draenei asked. Rielle's response was to lunge up and grab for the Draenei again. It didn't work, as the Draenei took her weight and shifted his own, spinning her around and slamming Rielle against a tree, the scarred Draenei immediately pressing his forearm against her throat, cutting off Rielle's air._

"_We __**ARE**__ seeking shelter NOW, child. Now you can walk there, or I can drag you, but this tantrum is __**DONE.**__" The Draenei said, pressing his forearm in harder. Rielle felt darkness begin to creep in at the edges of her vision, her seething rage starting to die under her more crucial needs like oxygen. Without the rage, her body lost its will to fight, and she partially slumped down before tapping the tree in a gesture of surrender. The Draenei ceased his chokehold, but new oxygen did not bring a new need for the female Draenei to continue fighting. Wordlessly, the male Draenei lead her to the nearby Azure Watch and into one of the huts located there, which was thankfully, also empty._

"_Tea?" The Draenei asked._

"_What does it matter?" Rielle said._

"_Why do you think it doesn't?" The Draenei said._

"_If you know who I am, you'll know."_

"_Rielle. Daughter of Irenus and Tekla." The Draenei said, sitting down in front of her and sipping from a mug._

"…_And?" Rielle said._

"_The only other things I know is you've had some rudimentary combat training which seems to have worked, and that you seemed to be very upset, considering your lack of proper clothing for the rain."_

"_The former doesn't matter and the latter you wouldn't understand." Rielle said._

"_Perhaps. What I do understand is what I said before. You're running a risk of letting yourself go to waste."_

"_How can I go to waste when I have nothing to offer…?"_

"_Nothing to offer? When you made me struggle to contain you? Something not many of your fellows have done? When you got out of my disabling hold? That's all nothing?"_

"_It's nothing that my people want." Rielle said, lowering her head._

"_Hmmmm. Perhaps." The Draenei said. "But things are changing, young lady. If you don't like what they claim, well…perhaps there will soon be other viewpoints to have. And even if not…their viewpoints can only define you as much…"_

"_Just stop with the empty platitudes. It's old and has been done before." Rielle said._

"_Fine. I'll extend an offer instead. My latest crop of trainees will begin lessons in five days. I want you to be among them."_

"…_pardon?" Rielle said, raising her eyes again. "And you are?"_

"_I'm Melor. I teach the ways of combat for those not given the strength of the Light or the Arcane. There __**is **__power outside of those two ways, Rielle. I believe you have the potential to tap into its greatest depths."_

"…_oh please. Are you really trying to pull the wise mentor comes just when needed to fix the broken cynic act?"_

"_I can't fix you, Rielle. It's not my duty, and my interests are purely selfish. I'm not as young and as healthy as I used to be, and I want to make sure that when my time comes I've done everything possible to leave my species in good hands. And that includes not letting you throw away the skills you might have because of some pointless angst. Or worse."_

"_Oh really. And what could be worse, Melor?" Rielle said._

"_I'm not the one sitting soaked to the skin with rain that may or may not be toxic." Melor said. Rielle glanced down, worry creasing her face. "You ran out without a thought, clearly. You let your rage completely take control. And you have a great deal of rage. There's more to learning the fight as I see it then just swinging a weapon or dodging a blow. It's about learning the rage, turning it to your side. If you don't…one day it may just eat you instead. And nothing good lies down that path."_

_Rielle was silent for a few seconds before she wiped her face with her hand. The rain had done well to hide her tears._

"_Come. See if what I can teach you appeals. If not, leave. I won't stop you." Melor said. "What do you have to lose?"_

"_What do I have to gain?" Rielle said._

"_You know I can't answer that." Melor said. "Tea?"

* * *

_

_**Now.**_

In the end, maybe her teacher hadn't given her all the answers.

Maybe he hadn't fully salved the sense of isolation and disappointment her species seemed to hold towards her. Maybe he hadn't made her feel truly comfortable within her own skin. But he had never claimed otherwise, and he had taught her a great deal about life.

And the rage. The monster living in her heart and soul. He'd been right about that, more than anything. She'd done all she could to tame it, to make it part of her. And it was.

But it would never truly change what it was, either. And now, in a truly desperate situation, one beyond virtually any kind of teaching or preparation, it was out.

Rielle wanted to live.

_It _wanted blood.

It was not, however, the first eruption of rage Mug'thol had ever seen. He had not risen to be overlord of the Crushridge Clan by chance. He had faced anger before, many times, from his own kind and all the smaller ones, and smashed it to a pulp.

So when Rielle let out an ear-piercing cry and charged at him, he merely got his club ready and prepared to tenderize his meat some more, Rielle diving in mid-run for her axe…

Then somersaulting as she did so, pulling the axe along with her and hurling it through the air. It spun in a deadly arc…one that missed Mug'thol entirely, the weapon flying past his arm. It served, however, to distract the ogre and allow Rielle to close in again.

Mug'thol thought he'd seen rage in his life.

He hadn't seen anything yet.

Rielle seized her hands on the damaged piece of armor that Mug'thol had strapped to his stomach, pulling at the cracked and worn leather straps as hard as she could. Mug'thol yelled in surprise again, before hammering Rielle with a punch that briefly knocked her to her knees. Mug'thol tried to position his club to follow up the blow, and again re-discovered that with Rielle so close to him, he couldn't swing it to hit her.

A problem he fixed by grabbing Rielle and hurling her backwards. Snorting crude laughter, he brought the club back and lashed out with it again, going low to break the Draenei's legs.

Mug'thol's brilliant idea to keep Rielle from ducking his attack didn't work, as she simply jumped over it instead, closing back in. She was barely aware of the crippling injury she had just avoided, nor the methods she'd used to prevent it. Her mind had long dissolved into the snapping, vicious tangle of her rage, and all her thoughts were undeviating in their goal.

_RIP AND TEAR! RIP AND TEAR HIS GUTS!_

Rielle seized onto the armor stomach plate and yanked again with all her strength, Mug'thol utterly flabbergasted at the Draenei going from using tricks to not doing so. Unfortunately for Mug'thol, his armor's far-from-pristine leather straps picked that time to give up the ghost, Rielle tearing the armor piece free.

_HE IS HUGE! THAT MEANS HE HAS HUGE GUTS!_

Mug'thol's latest punch also met with failure, as the Draenei yanked up the piece of armor she'd torn off and used it as a makeshift shield, blunting the ogre's blow even as the Draenei dropped the armor and lanced out with her hand, going for the small wound her axe had made where it had cut through the armor.

_**RIP AND TEAR!**_

Mug'thol roared in pain and the ogre version of alarm as Rielle sank her nails into the cut and both forced and yanked at the wound, trying to drill her fingers deeper into his torso even as she also tried to make the injury bigger. Mug'thol's retaliation was swift and brutal, the ogre bringing his free fist down onto the Draenei, and again, and again, trying to get the out of control alien to stop her attempted disemboweling. That, at least, was successful, the ogre managing to stop Rielle's attack and smash her back onto her knees…

At which point she slithered around him and began doing the exact same thing to another cut on his back. Mug'thol bellowed again and twisted around, trying to get the nearly-psychotic alien off of him. Rielle seized onto Mug'thol's clothing and rode out the effort, fresh blood spraying on her face as she raked and tore at the injury.

"RARGGGHHHH!" Mug'thol yelled, lurching around before a plan bloomed in his less-than-optimal brain. The move hadn't worked the first time, but his enemy no longer had her weapon!

So Mug'thol repeated himself, charging backwards into the nearest wall. This time, it worked, and Mug'thol drove every bit of momentum his mass could utilize to hammer the Draenei into the rock. He felt his enemy's body fall, and in the most graceful move an ogre could really do, he hooked his foot around her and kicked Rielle across the room before she could spring back up and resume her attack.

The Draenei lay still, blue blood leaking onto the floor around her. Mug'thol almost immediately went after her, and then in another rare thinking move, instead brought his club up and tried to smash her where she lay. The alien moved at the last second and sprang back up, the rage ever-burning on her face.

"Kill youuuuuuu…" Rielle rasped, crouching down. A swing from Mug'thol's club kept her away, the Draenei weaving away and moving to charge again. In a first for Mug'thol, a glance at the wall behind him caused him to have, again for the first time in his life, three good ideas in a row. With his back placed against the stone, the Draenei couldn't get around him with her sneakiness, forcing her to attack him at his front, where he was superior.

"So you think you strong? You savage?" Mug'thol said, indicating his wounds before gesturing with his club. "This nothing! YOU nothing!"

"Heard THAT beforeeeee…" Rielle said. "DIDN'T LIKE IT THEN AND SURE DON'T NOW."

Rielle's charge was interrupted by Mug'thol's club again, the ogre lashing out with a mighty swing and driving the alien back. Mug'thol swung the club back and forth a few more times, continuing to hold Rielle at bay.

"What's wrong? Scarrreedd…?" Rielle said.

"MUG'THOL SCARED OF NOTHING! STRONGEST OF CRUSHRIDGE, OF OG-!" Mug'thol thundered, lashing out with his club.

Even as Rielle leapt up and landed on it, sprinting down its length.

Right into Mug'thol's trap, as he immediately dropped his weapon. Rielle didn't notice, lancing in to claw at his injured stomach, causing her to instead run into the ogre's now free hand. Mug'thol was no genius, but he knew that if he let his enemy get in too close he was at risk. But if he let her get a little close, and held her at range…

She was his. Mug'thol clamped his fingers down and lashed out, smashing his fist into Rielle's face. The Draenei shrieked, clawing at his hand that held her, trying to break through, but the ogre held his grip as he hammered on Rielle with his other fist, blow after blow. After several, he felt the pressure on his hand lessen. After a few more, the Draenei fell down to her knees before him.

Mug'thol didn't stop, smashing his fist down on the Draenei's back and shoulders a few more times before she was finally face-down in the dust. Breathing heavily, the ogre finally released his grip.

At which point Rielle surged up and seized her own, shoving her hand under Mug'thol's armor and seizing onto a delicate part of his anatomy.

The scream the ogre made would have almost been comical had Rielle not currently been viewing everything through a red haze, her fingers crushing and twisting the ogre's testicles as hard as she could. Mug'thol hammered a few more punches down on Rielle's body, blows made even stronger by pain and desperation, but they did not cause the Draenei to relinquish her grip. Unfortunately, Rielle's effective attack had completely tunneled her vision: instead of trying to exploit any opening her effort had caused, she had focused entirely on turning what was in her hand to mush…

It proved her undoing, as Mug'thol had his last good idea and stopped trying to move Rielle, instead moving himself forward, scooping up the warrior and, with a desperate, furious roar, charged across the room and smashed Rielle into the wall as hard as he could.

The impact again jarred the Draenei loose, but Mug'thol didn't let her fall to the ground again, instead pulling back and ramming the Draenei into the wall once more.

Rielle responded by reaching up and punching the ogre in the face as hard as she could. Fresh pain shot through Mug'thol's broken nose, but all it did was cause him to recoil off the wall and charge across the room again, Rielle punching him in the face all the way.

The second impact briefly made her hand fall…before it snaked back up and seized onto the crude piece of armor Mug'thol had strapped to his right shoulder. Mug'thol's response was to turn around and barrel across the room once more, driving Rielle into the wall with ever-greater bone-crushing force. Rielle held her grip.

So Mug'thol turned and charged across the room again. Blue blood splashed against the ogre's face from the impact, but Rielle held onto the armor. When Mug'thol turned and finally smashed Rielle back onto the floor, the armor piece went with her.

A victory at a high cost, as Mug'thol violently stomped on her as hard as he could. Then, for good measure, he did it again before stepping back, staring at the Draenei's limp form.

A few seconds later, Rielle began to move. Despite all her body had suffered, the rage refused to die. All the hours, days, weeks, months of training had been for moments like this, when the body had been pushed to limits sane people would never contemplate. She'd endured it all to forge herself into a weapon…

But every weapon breaks.

Especially when furious ogres brought their clubs down on them.

"SMASH!" Mug'thol roared, having picked up his weapon and done just that. The ceiling kept the ogre from doing a full-power overhead swing, but the ogre by now was so angry that he didn't really need the extra windup: he took the room he had and used it against the Draenei.

"CRUSH! KILL! DIE!" The ogre bellowed, as he brought his weapon down on the alien again and again, like a pile driver, hammering Rielle until the wounds on Mug'thol's arms would not let him swing any more. The feat of being so exhausted that he couldn't fight was new to Mug'thol, but he wasn't stupid enough to resist it, finally ceasing his blows.

"…hah. Hah hah." Mug'thol said, drawing back his club and looking at the remains of his enemy. He poked the Draenei's body with the end of his club a few times anyway: the alien did not stir. Mug'thol snorted, and then grimaced as the many pains of his body reminded him of their presence. The cost in blood the warrior had taken from him.

But it didn't matter. Ogres were the strongest of all creatures, and Mug'thol was strongest of ogres. He would heal quickly. Better yet, when he brought the head of the enemy who had killed so many of his clan, said clan would forever be under his sway, no one willing to challenge his strength. And in his castle, his once more, he would roast his foe and eat well…

Rielle began to move. In her motion, Mug'thol abruptly became aware of just how much his wounds still hurt.

The ogre grit his teeth, and almost resumed smashing the Draenei before his arms lodged a protest. Said pain caused the ogre to realize just how slowly the warrior was moving. She might have been getting up, but she was getting up at such a sluggish pace an amateur warrior could have struck a killing blow twenty times over. Even so, Mug'thol felt anger rising back up in him. How could this meat endure so much? How could something so small be so stubborn in dying?

Enough was enough. Hammering repeatedly, again, on this meat was not the answer. Mug'thol was going to do what he did best and would have done much better had the confines of the room not hemmed him in. He was going to swing a full-power blow directly into the Draenei and knock her head right off.

"Herh. Not again. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on... you again! Fool me three times, and you is smart. Four times? You not that smart!*" Mug'thol said, drawing both hands to his club's base. Rielle had, by now, fully stood up, but her gaze had not returned to Mug'thol, instead drifting off to the side as if she wasn't even aware the ogre was there. Mug'thol thought he might have heard the Draenei say something, but it was too quiet for him to make out.

"Why still speak words? Words nothing. Small words, from small teeth. Matter not." Mug'thol said. "What you in end? Nothing but meat. DIE."

Mug'thol drew his arms back to his left and lashed out, the club whistling towards the Draenei.

It did not strike her head. Instead, Rielle threw up her arm, the club impacting against her palm. Instead of resisting and causing her arm to be crushed, Rielle immediately let her muscles go loose, her arm folding up and the club's impact shifting down it and to her body at large as she dug her hooves in, the club dragging her across the floor as Rielle bled all its strength and momentum out by countering it with her own.

She should have been dead. She should have been broken. But Rielle had been hearing what she SHOULD have been her whole life.

She'd learned to defy expectations, as she turned her blazing eyes back to the ogre, Mug'thol standing in stunned amazement that Rielle had stopped his strongest blow cold.

"EAT ME."

Rielle turned and brought her other arm down, smashing her elbow into the length of Mug'thol's club, the badly battered tree finally giving up the ghost and shattering to pieces from the precise blow. Mug'thol stumbled backwards in shock from the abrupt disintegration of his weapon, his eyes wide in stunned, uncomprehending surprise…

Even while Rielle snatched one of the pieces of wood that had flown into the air from the near-explosion of the club's demise and charged the final time.

Mug'thol roared in agony as the Draenei drove the length of wood into his stomach wound, the spike piercing through the flesh and muscles and impaling through his guts. His fists crashed down on Rielle, but the Draenei stood her ground and violently twisted the spear back and forth, fresh blood drenching her arms as she did, the ogre's roaring becoming a high-pitched shriek before his hands closed on Rielle's head.

Rielle slipped free, grabbed one of Mug'thol's fingers, and nearly tore it right off his hand. The new torment caused Mug'thol to stumble forward, almost falling on top of the Draenei…who grabbed onto Mug'thol's arms and yanked. The ogre fell to one knee, and Rielle leapt into the ogre's arms and pulled herself up onto his shoulders. Snarling, Mug'thol reached for her, only for Rielle to rake his eyes and draw his hand away in an instinctive reaction to the pain.

Pain. The oldest, best way to create an opening.

"YOU WANNA KNOW WHAT I AM?" Rielle yelled, pulling herself over to Mug'thol's exposed shoulder. "I'M A PAIN IN THE NECK!"

And with every last bit of strength she had, Rielle yanked Mug'thol's head to the side and sank her teeth into the throbbing veins of the ogre's flesh.

Mug'thol screamed, his hands grabbing at the Draenei, but Rielle held on like the mosquito from hell and continued to bite, pull, and rip away at the side of the ogre's throat. Blood exploded into her face, blinding her eyes and running down her throat, but she barely noticed, only wanting to bite deeper, harder, fiercer. Finally, she clamped onto a piece of gristle she couldn't chew through and yanked back her head, ripping out a fist-sized chunk of the ogre's neck and turning the blood spray into a fountain. Blinking sight back into her eyes, hardly even aware of the ogre's attempted defense which had by now turned into a futile attempt to cover the wound she'd made, Rielle's gaze seized onto the proud, singular horn on top of Mug'thol's moments before her hand did, her clenching fingers grabbing firmly onto the protrusion and pulling with all her might. Flesh tore and bone broke, as Rielle ripped the horn right off the top of Mug'thol's head, a small jeweled crown flying off unnoticed in the process.

Mug'thol staggered, his brain a mass of pain, his groping having grown weak. Rielle almost fell off the ogre's back, but held on even as she turned the horn over in her hand.

With one last swing, she buried it into the ogre's ragged neck wound. Mug'thol's cry was so soft, Rielle almost didn't hear it.

Then her own scream filled the room, as she reared back her head and smashed it down on the horn's end, driving the point deep into Mug'thol's body with one final spray of blood. The move nearly knocked her senseless, and her grip faded as she fell off the ogre's back, bouncing and coming to a stop some distance away.

Mug'thol managed one last lurching grasp, dull confusion in his eyes. What had…just…happened…?

The sound of the ogre's collapsing form seemed to reverberate through the whole castle, and then Mug'thol moved no more.

Silence settled over the war zone, save for the faint noise of the storm outside.

Silence that was finally broken by ragged breathing, as Rielle crawled over to the nearest wall and used it to drag herself up. Somehow, she found she could still stand. Still walk, as she slowly crept over to Mug'thol's body.

For a moment, the Draenei stood there, breathing slowly and deeply, looking at her handiwork, before she closed her eyes.

Looked at what lay within her, and what it had done.

The beast was sated. It had returned to its cage and her service, well-pleased by what it had been granted. Content that it had allowed its 'host' to live another day, to grant her the power and the drive to win despite all she had endured.

A small part of Rielle's mind cried out what it had made of her, but it was a quiet voice, only there as a reminder. In her heart of hearts, Rielle felt okay.

This was who she was. Part of it was ugly, but what drove it was not.

The fact she had a life worth living.

Something shifted inside her mouth. Rielle blinked at the sensation, then flexed her cheek before turning her head, spitting out a chunk of ogre onto the floor before turning the once-again soft glow of her eyes onto her vanquished enemy.

"…small _words_, Mugthol? No. Just one." Rielle said. "Victory."


	28. War Between The Roses: Cold Snap

Chapter 28: Cold Snap

"_Some say the world will end in fire;  
Some say in ice.  
From what I've tasted of desire  
I hold with those who favor fire.  
But if it had to perish twice,  
I think I know enough of hate  
To know that for destruction ice  
Is also great  
And would suffice."

* * *

_

_**Then.**_

_**Before the Third War. Before Lordaeron's fall. Before the Forsaken. Before so much of the world changed.**_

"_What's it say Zackel?" Mirade Hom said. A tow-headed girl of nine years old, she wore ragged hand-made cloth clothing that had seen more than a few patches in its time. The girl did not stand out though, as her two companions wore essentially the same thing._

"_Let's see…" Zackel Jude said, peering at the sign. While he was two years younger than his brother Daldion, he was generally the better reader. Considering that his brother was bigger and stronger, Zackel rarely saw this as a disadvantage._

"_If…you…are…going…to…cross…this…field…" Zackel read slowly. "Make…sure…you…can…do…it…in…nine…seconds."_

_Confusion crossed Mirade's face, as did Daldion's. Zackel shared their puzzled looks, before peering down and seeing a second sign beneath the first._

"…_Because…the…bull…can…do…it…in…ten…seconds."_

"…_What bull?" Daldion said, getting up on the wooden fencing that had stopped the trio's advance, peering around the empty field that it blocked off. Zackel swiftly joined him, realizing that his brother was right. There were several bushes and a sagging tree in the field, but no bull. No animals at all, as far as Zackel could tell._

"_I don't see a bull. Do you see a bull?" Daldion said._

"_No." Zackel said, trying to climb higher on the fence to see if it helped. It didn't. "Maybe it's not here now?"_

"_Then let's go!" Daldion said, leaping over the fence and into the open field._

"…_uh, Daldion, maybe we shouldn't…" Zackel said._

"_Come on brother! We can't see any bull, so let's go!"_

"_But that doesn't mean…" Zackel said, and then Mirade cut him off by climbing over the fence and following his brother. "Mirade, wait!"_

"_But there's no bull Zackel!" Mirade said, turning around to face the young boy._

"_Come on! Hurry up! Or else the deer will get all the Peacebloom berries!" Daldion said from where he stood, about two-thirds of the way across the field._

_Zackel was about to reply when he saw the bushes moving, his young eyes drawn to the movement._

_Zackel's caution, as it turned out, had been the correct action. The bull, who went by the charming name of Tyrant, was indeed out of sight, mainly because over time it had carved out a furrow between some bushes it liked to nap in. Napping had been just what Tyrant had been doing, before loud child voices woke him up. Never having been friendly in the best of moods, being woken up put him in among the worst, as he pushed himself out from within the bushes, shaking his head._

"_Oh no." Daldion said._

"_DALDION RUN! RUN!" Zackel yelled. Tyrant took the advice first, breaking into a full sprint towards the young boy. Daldion yelped and ran for his life, trying to reach the other side of the fence first._

_To a grown man, what Zackel did next would likely be considered stupid. But to a young boy scared for his brother, it made perfect sense, and hence he jumped off the fence and ran after Daldion and Tyrant. And Mirade, equally lacking sense, followed him._

_Though technically, neither Zackel or Mirade ran AFTER Tyrant. The bull had begun chasing Daldion from his side, while Daldion had run for the other fence. By proper definition, Zackel and Mirade were chasing Daldion and running TOWARDS Tyrant, who was running towards where Daldion was. Daldion, meanwhile, was running to the fence and hence technically away from Tyrant: the young boy managed to get to said fence and leap over it several seconds before Tyrant would have run him down._

_It was right about then that Zackel realized just what a tactical error he had made and drew up short. Mirade mirrored his actions, even while Tyrant turned around to face the pair._

"_Uh oh." Zackel said. Mirade, lacking something new to say, merely screamed._

"_NO! ZACKEL!" Daldion yelled from the other side of the fence, as Tyrant wheeled around and went after his little brother. Zackel had already turned to run, but he could tell that in a straight chasing sprint to the fence instead of an attempted interception, the bull would win. It was what the sign had warned, after all._

"_THE TREE!' Zackel yelled, grabbing Mirade and pulling her to the nearby tree that had been planted in the field as fast as he could. Fortunately, both Zackel and Mirade were good climbers, reaching the tree and scrambling up it before Tyrant reached it._

_Unperturbed, the bull rammed into the tree full force. The impact nearly knocked the two children right back out of it._

"_Ahhhhh! ZACKEL!" Mirade cried, holding desperately onto the tree side where she crouched._

"_Hold on!" Zackel said, trying to figure out what to do. Tyrant, annoyed by the constant loud noise, backed up and rammed the tree again, forcing the young boy to grab hold of it before he was tossed down to the bull's mercy._

"_HEY! LEAVE THEM ALONE!' Daldion yelled, picking up and throwing rocks at the bull to try and get its attention. Unfortunately, his small child arms lacked the strength to get the rocks all the way to his target, and hence Tyrant remained focused on his victims._

"_HELP!" Zackel screamed. "HELP! PLEASE! SOMEONE HE-!"_

_Tyrant crashed into the tree full-bore a third time. Screaming, Mirade finally lost her balance and fell, frantically grabbing the branch she'd been on before she hit the ground. It just caused her to dangle from the tree like a piñata, Tyrant turning towards the young girl to run her down._

"_NO!' Zackel yelled, crouching down and trying to reach for Mirade to pull her back up, vaguely aware of a sudden pressure in his chest. "LEAVE HER ALONE!"_

_The pressure suddenly shifted, flowing down Zackel's arm._

_The bolt of energy lashed out from Zackel's clutching palm and struck Tyrant directly between the eyes. Zackel was so surprised at this that he inadvertently fell out of the tree, crashing down on the grass at its base. Once again, Mirade mirrored his action, partially due to lack of strength and partially due to her own surprise._

_Tyrant, however, was in no state to take advantage. The bull had reared off, shaking its head, feeling like a swarm of angry bees had set about its face. Zackel managed to only stare for a few seconds before he got up, helped Mirade up, and fled towards where Daldion was standing on the fence, his own surprise having rooted him there. Tyrant did not seem to notice, the aggression knocked out of him._

"…_Zackel, what did you do?" Daldion said, once his brother and Mirade were safely on the other side of the fence with him._

"…_I…don't know." Zackel said, looking at his hand._

"…_Cool! Do it again!" Daldion said, already having dismissed the deadly events as only children could. _

"_I can't…" Zackel said, repeatedly thrusting his hand out. "I don't know what…"_

_Tyrant rudely interrupted the trio's attention by crashing against the fence, causing the three children to scream and scramble away. Having recovered from the strange blow, the bull stalked around the wooden barricade, glaring at the small animals that had both disturbed and escaped it. The children returned the animal's gaze, even as they became aware of a distant approaching voice. One that sounded quite cross._

"…_Are we gonna get in trouble?" Mirade asked._

"_Not if we don't get caught. Let's go!" Daldion said, and the three children took off. And as Daldion had said, they didn't._

_Circumstances, however, would never allow Zackel and Daldion to tell anyone what had happened that afternoon. Their father, Craleld, had been having a strong sense of unease about the Tirisfal Glades for some time, and shortly after that day informed his family that they would be leaving. Packing up their possessions, the Jude family had traversed the Eastern Kingdoms, ultimately re-establishing a new farm on the borders of Elwynn Forest and Westfall. The long, hard journey and settlement caused Zackel and Daldion to forget what Zackel had done up in the tree._

_Years would pass. In time, Zackel would re-discover his blessing, even as Daldion would discover he possessed it as well. And thus would the brothers' path be set.

* * *

_

_**To Now.**_

Zackel Wintersoul burned.

For two seconds.

The howling winds surged down, wrapping around Zackel as he crossed his arms before him. The hungry fires seemed to be seized up and strangled by the gales, pulled away and devoured within the space of a few more seconds. Zackel's robe was left covered with scorch marks, his face marked with soot, and his hair badly singed, but that seemed to be it, even as he slowly lowered his arms and looked at the shocked face of Grel'borg the Miser.

"…Not…bad, ogre." Zackel said. "You have any more flavors?"

"How did you…?" Grel'borg said, before Zackel snapped out his staff and blasted another battering ram of ice at the ogre. The attack drove Grel'borg back across the roof before he finally turned it away, throwing the mass of ice to the side.

"You should be DYING!" Grel'borg snarled over the storm. "What HAPPENED?"

"You set me on fire. I put it out before it could start doing damage." Zackel said, lowering his staff so he could put his weight on it. "I will admit, if you'd outright sprang it on me, I probably would be a lot worse off."

"How did you…?"

"Come ogre. Since the moment we met, all you've used is fire. Very powerful, very skillful fire…but fire nonetheless. Did you really think I couldn't possibly predict that, at some point, you might try and set me on fire? I was born at night. Not last night." Zackel said. "So perhaps, it seems, we've come to an impasse."

"ME SAY OTHERWISE!" Grel'borg said, thrusting out his hand and firing a wolf-sized fireball at the mage. Zackel lashed up his hand, the howling wind seizing the projectile and carrying it up and off into the sky where it was snuffed out.

"…why are we doing this?" Zackel said.

"You do not…!"

"Yes, I remember. I supposedly am not possessing of worth. What specific worth, you refuse to tell me." Zackel said. "But I haven't stopped thinking, ogre. About why you'd have a grudge."

Grel'borg slammed his staff down, causing an eruption of fire beneath Zackel that the mage just managed to dodge by jumping backwards. Even so, Zackel was quickly realizing that the seeming ease that Zackel had 'demonstrated' in shrugging off Grel'borg's immolation attack had rattled the ogre: his most recent magic attacks had been considerably easier to read and counter.

"I suppose it could be because you want something I have to make you stronger, but based on what you've shown me, I don't really know what that is or could be." Zackel said. "I suppose you could be seeking revenge for the ogres in your clan I killed, but something like that doesn't match the efforts you've likely had to go through showing up here now instead of earlier. Or maybe you just look at me and are reminded of what you are, and that's enough to what to kill me."

"You think you better, stronger, because you MAN? Grel'borg kill men! Many men! You just LATEST!" Grel'borg said, swinging back his arm and lashing a whip of fire across the whole roof. Zackel ducked under the attack, losing a few more hairs in the process.

"Yes. I am a man. A smart man. One who couldn't see any of those reasons working. So based on that, and your words…you're trying to prove something."

Grel'borg hurled more fireballs. The greater effort Zackel had to make to destroy them made him realize the ogre was getting his head back together. He didn't have much time left.

"Look! Whatever wrong I did you, I am sorry! Neither of us has to die today!" Zackel said. "If you want me to concede you're my better, I do so! You kicked my ass! Can't we just call it even then and go our own separate ways?"

Grel'borg was silent, cocking his head at Zackel.

"Oh yes, this sounds idiotic. Talking this way to an ogre. You're right. If I was talking to most any other ogre, I wouldn't be wasting my breath." Zackel said. "But you're not just an ogre. You're like me. A mage. How ogres became magi and how I became one doesn't matter. We're cut from the same cloth. You're not stupid. So why is this coming across to me as profoundly just that?"

"…Me want you dead. That, that." Grel'borg said, taking up his staff in a new grip. "Me strong, you weak manling."

"…Perhaps. But I try. I tried." Zackel said, taking up a similar stance. "That's the kind of man I am."

"You NOTHING!" Grel'borg said, fire exploding in the air before him.

"So you've made clear." Zackel said, his own icy energies manifesting. "Show me."

Grel'borg slammed his arms forward, fire erupting outward in an expanding mass. Zackel mirrored his action, firing off a countering ice blast in return.

The two met in an eruption of scalding steam, Zackel immediately feeling the pressure in his body from the ogre's offensive efforts. If the ogre was feeling the same, Zackel couldn't tell; the attack and its steam cloud had completely obscured the ogre from sight.

Zackel swiftly got an answer anyway, as the fire boiled over and began pushing back his ice. Zackel grit his teeth and put more effort into his attack. It recovered his lost ground, but only briefly, the fire then coming back stronger than ever.

Zackel fell to one knee and redoubled his efforts again, but the fire blast did not get forced back. Somewhere in the steam, Zackel could hear Grel'borg's laughter. Sweat ran down the mage's face, the liquid stinging whenever it reached his burns.

Zackel took a deep breath, and then stopped his attack. Grel'borg's fire exploded forth, burning everything in its path.

Grel'borg roared delighted laughter, but it didn't last, as he realized he'd heard no shriek of pain or death come from the mage. The ogre began stalking forward before he stopped, realizing something else.

The steam cloud that had enveloped the whole roof also remained, something that should NOT have happened. With no more conflict between the mages, the storm should have torn through the obscuring vapor and dispersed it in seconds…

It hadn't. The steam cloud was staying. The storm wasn't touching it.

…the storm was obeying the mage.

Grel'borg snorted, turning his staff around as he tried to sense the mage's fire again. His snort turned into a snarl when his vision, instead of locating a clear target, instead returned a mass of shifting, merging motion, any of which could have been the mage. The steam cloud, unlike the obscuring blizzard, was far too hot to pick out an individual's body heat within it. The anger swelled more deeply within the ogre, even as he turned around some more.

"…he cannot hide from me! Not even with this!" Grel'borg said, pointing his staff. "His tricks are crafted of paper…!"

The blue bolt impacted near Grel'borg, a flash of blue light sending a spear of ice out and tearing across the ogre's arm. Grel'borg stumbled away with a yell, even as two more blue bolts struck nearby. One fired a spear into his chest; the other went for his leg and missed. Grel'borg was too angry to notice, smashing the spear aside and whirling around with another snarl.

"Still hiding?" Zackel said, posing his sentence as a response rather than an actual question. Grel'borg turned and fired a blast of fire towards the voice: he struck nothing, and before the ogre could compensate, more blue energy bolts flew towards him. Grel'borg lashed out with his staff, a whip of fire shattering the spears before they could get to him, which just allowed the resulting follow-up ice daggers to crash into his shoulder.

"ENOUGH OF THIS!" Grel'borg thundered, as he began drawing the heat of the steam into him. He only had to do it for a second before the storm abruptly returned, sweeping away the hot mist and leaving his target clear, standing in front of him. "NOW I HAVE YOU!"

"Maybe." Zackel said, and slammed his hand down.

Grel'borg looked up just in time for the giant wagon-sized ball of ice to fall down onto him with a thunderous crash.

Zackel hadn't been commanding the storm, not precisely. He'd merely been briefly directing its energies.

"Courtesy of my brother." Zackel said, slowly walking towards the fallen ogre, watching for any movement. "He was ten times the man I was, but I'd like to think…"

The explosion of fire came out of nowhere, Zackel caught up and thrown backwards by the attack. He landed on his bad hand again, the pain causing him to briefly cry out before he swallowed it. Grel'borg's dark chuckle confirmed to Zackel that he hadn't hid it well enough.

"Too bad HE not here." Grel'borg said, pulling himself up. "Maybe he actually do something I feel."

Zackel stared grimly at the ogre. Despite his best efforts to compensate, his broken hand had gotten in the way again: the ice ball hadn't struck Grel'borg with enough impact to do proper damage. Neither had Zackel's ice spears; in fact, despite how Zackel's brain had finally gotten into gear after overcoming his near-incineration, none of his spells seemed to be lining up with it.

The ogre magi's fire mastery ran even deeper than Zackel had realized. It seemed to be actively blunting the blows that the mage did land. And…

…That didn't matter. He was still in the game, and he still had to win.

"You full of tricks mage, but I full of POWER!" Grel'borg said, slamming his staff out and firing off another spray of fireballs. Zackel put his own up before him, willing his power through it to deflect the attacks away, even as he swallowed deeply.

Then he reached out into the storm once more.

Grel'borg continued the assault for several seconds before he realized the chill that was settling onto him. He ignored it, believing it to be a brief side effect of his directed magical energies. It would soon adapt…

Except it didn't. The cold the ogre could feel only increased. His eyes catching movement, the ogre discovered that frost was actually creeping up his extended arms.

The storm wind seemed to howl directly into the ogre's ear, and realization came. The mage was directing the storm again. He was trying, actually trying, to FREEZE HIM TO DEATH.

Grel'borg would have laughed out loud if he hadn't decided it was a waste of energy. Instead, he promptly showed the human mage his folly, and ceased his attack.

The ice daggers flew directly at the ogre, the human clearly expecting an opening. Grel'borg batted them aside with a gesture, continuing his slow stalk towards the mage.

The concentrated chill on Grel'borg's body multiplied even more, Zackel no longer trying to hide the fact. Grel'borg kept walking, even as his power and will surged up within him in response, countering the mage's deadly cold. The white frost that had formed on him began to melt, and despite Zackel's best efforts, he could not instigate its return.

The power built to a roar within Grel'borg, all he had learned and earned.

Built to a release.

The ogre's arms blurred out as he sent the fireball out from him, said ball nearly as massive as his form. Zackel's eyes went wide before he tried to mount a frantic defense.

Too late.

The explosion shook the roof anew, and Zackel tumbled backwards out of it before he smashed into the sealed-off entrance that was opposite of the one he and Grel'borg had come through, immediately falling to the stone before it in a smoking heap. Grel'borg snorted again: the mage had managed enough of a guard to not get reduced to ash, but he doubted the mage felt good about that fact. Or good in any way.

"Trick after trick after trick. All the same end." Grel'borg said. "You ask why I say you nothing? Look at self!"

Zackel's only response was an anguished cough, the mage trying to get up without letting go of his staff. Between the damage he'd inflicted on it before for spare parts and this fight, the protective enchantments on his robe weren't going to hold out much longer, and definitely not against anything that big again. Fel, even breathing hurt after that last fire attack.

"…why…is it so important…that I…be…"

Grel'borg's response was another fireball. Zackel barely dodged to the side, his mind working furiously.

The second fireball caught him square in the chest, blowing him backwards against the sealed-off buttress. Zackel's staff clattered at his feet as his gave out, leaving him sitting limply on the ground.

"Because it needed!" Grel'borg said: Zackel looked through blurry eyes as the ogre patted his chest in a confident gesture as he spoke. "Only one it not clear to is you."

"…stubborn…" Zackel said, pulling himself up via the wall with his good hand before calling his staff back to him. "That's the kind of man I am."

"Not much longer." Grel'borg said, and hurled another lance of fire.

Zackel had no real idea how he dodged the attack. He was certain he'd at least lost an ear to it, even as he willed strength back into his legs. He couldn't get pinned down.

So he surprised even himself, and charged.

"HA? WHAT THIS?" Grel'borg said as the mage ran towards the ogre. "You think this change?"

Zackel's response was to lash out his staff, hurling a crescent blade of ice towards the ogre. Grel'borg deflected it as he always did, but Zackel had immediately followed it up with others, forcing the ogre into a constant defense as he covered the distance. The ogre narrowed his eyes, a wicked glint in them, and Zackel saw fire shoot up his staff, even as the ogre put a hand on his chest again.

The last piece of the puzzle clicked in, even as Zackel closed in, lashing his staff out one last time.

This time, he stabbed it forward. Grel'borg instinctively went into another defense.

It was wasted, as Zackel had not thrown more ice. Instead, he'd manifested a block of the material floating in mid-air in front of him.

In the back of his head, a voice screamed that of the few dozen times Zackel had tried this in friendly duels, he'd only succeeded once. And the key word there was _friendly_.

Zackel's only response was to snap his staff close to him before he lifted up his leg and stepped up on the ice, the frozen water briefly defying gravity and giving Zackel just a second of lift…

Another frozen block flashed into existence before him, and Zackel stepped up and off that one too. Grel'borg's eyes went wide, as the third and last block manifested and Zackel stepped up and off it as well. The ice blocks crashed down to the ground, their purpose served: Zackel had literally walked on air for a moment, and used it to get the height advantage.

Sometimes, he who dared won, as Zackel flew over the ogre's head and turned around, a blade of ice manifesting on his staff.

Even with only one hand holding it, Zackel felt the ice cut deep as he lashed out at Grel'borg's back and caught him just below the shoulder, gorging a bloody line down the ogre's body and partially down his leg before the blade slipped off and slammed into the ground. Blood dotted Zackel's face as the ogre roared its pain, even as Zackel tried to get away…

Too slow. The ogre's fist crashed against Zackel's face, throwing him backwards several feet before the mage landed with a crash, just managing to hold onto his staff. Stars swam before Zackel's eyes, which were quickly swallowed by a jaw that felt like it had ripped right off and threatened to consume the mage in darkness. Pain. Even prepared for it, Zackel had never been good at handling pain.

He'd approached that issue with the same technique he always did: learn from it. He had. Some in the fashion of coping mechanisms for it, especially when it came to combat tactics….

And some in the way of combat tactics itself.

"STUPID MAN!" Grel'borg yelled, whirling around, his staff still burning with terrible power. "YOU…!"

"Up to my old tricks." Zackel said, pointing. The ogre looked down.

It was amazing how well a painful back wound kept one from noticing a blue circle of power that had been laid beneath him. Hunters weren't the only ones who could lay frost traps.

Zackel's was one of his own special design.

The ice erupted, a twisting mass of cutting, impaling lances shooting up and tearing across Grel'borg's front, like the ogre had been raked by a giant clawed hand. The trap had been perfectly timed to exploit the hole that Zackel had observed in the ogre's defenses when he attacked, and it showed in Grel'borg's cry, a noise of true suffering. More blood spattered the snowy rooftop, Grel'borg stumbling and almost falling down before he regained his feet, his black robes having been reduced to ragged tatters from Zackel's two strikes.

For a moment, the ogre stood there, breathing heavily and leaning on his staff. Zackel managed to get back up, swallowing once more as he got ready. He wanted to make another appeal, to try and stop this fight…but as smart as Grel'borg seemed to be for his kind, he was still an ogre.

Zackel knew, no matter how intelligence the ogre might have somehow become, what was coming regardless of that fact.

He'd planned for it.

Grel'borg's eyes almost seemed ready to catch fire themselves when they looked at Zackel, and the frost mage briefly felt like someone had taken a drill to his teeth. He knew then, without a doubt, that within the next minute, the battle was going to be over.

"DAMN YOU!" Grel'borg roared, a screen of fireballs erupting into existence all around him. Zackel's only response was to hold out his staff.

"Troublesome. That's the kind of man I am."

Grel'borg's barrage of fire was so intense that Zackel swore he almost caught alight again simply from the effort he had to make to defend from it. Zackel fought through the sensation, holding his defense. The ogre was rapidly burning through his magical energies now, all he had to do was hold out and strike before the ogre realized it…!

Grel'borg began lashing out with his staff, sending fiery whips to mix in with the blasts. Zackel manifested another ice wall before him, and when the whips swiftly tore through that he got down on one knee and tried to hold on, his injured hand close, the frost energies gathering on that…

More fireballs came, along with another fire bolt that exploded the stone next to Zackel and pelted the mage with hot, stinging shards. Zackel took one last deep breath.

Then he charged again.

His angled loop when he started caused him to dodge the second fire bolt, the intense ray burning more of his robe to ashes. Zackel ran a few steps, fireballs flying all around him, and then he did three quick staff gestures.

The first two fired ice projectiles that were blown out of the sky before they got anywhere near Grel'borg. It served to get his attention.

The last manifested a sheet of ice on the ground between Zackel and the ogre.

Zackel went low and threw himself on his back, sliding down the ice a second before a third fire blast would have blown a hole in his stomach. Grel'borg's eyes jerked down as the mage slid in under the ogre's wall of projectiles, slashing his staff down to aim at him…

Which was when Zackel tossed out the ace in the hole he'd been hoarding the whole time and thrust his staff at the ogre, firing off the counter spell he'd been developing throughout the whole battle he'd fought and jamming Grel'borg's offense in its tracks. Zackel immediately followed this by slashing his staff down into the ice, causing it to abruptly shift in a drastic fashion, in this case up, with the end result of hurling Zackel into the air.

The mage brought up his injured hand, even as he drew level with the ogre. Then he thrust it out.

The cold energies surged from his palm, striking Grel'borg directly in the face and overwhelming his protective 'hot-bloodedness', the icy energies piercing through his eyes and into Grel'borg's brain beyond. Zackel hit the ground, almost losing his balance and plowing into the ogre before he took a knee, even while Grel'borg reared back, his staff clattering at his feet, the ogre clawing at his face.

"Be painless." Zackel said, as the ogre continued to thrash. The freezing would render him blind moments before it caused the liquid in his skull to freeze in turn, turning his gray matter into ice cubes and sending him into the cold dark.

Grel'borg stopped. Zackel's eyebrows arched, and then his heart dropped into his stomach as he saw steam rising from Grel'borg's face.

"It can't be…" Zackel said, for the first time at a loss as Grel'borg lowered his hands. The ogre had fought off the killing strike. He'd somehow broken out of the spell lock and turned away Zackel's fatal cold spell. HOW? How had the ogre…?

"Rarrgghh, rargghh…" Grel'borg grunted, before darkly red energies erupted on his hands. "RARGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

"Oh no." Zackel said.

The flame pulse that erupted off of Grel'borg's body not only melted _all _the gathered snow off the _whole _roof, it nearly set the nigh-unburnable stone on fire. Several of the stones exploded from the abrupt temperature change, showing Grel'borg with red hot shrapnel. The ogre didn't even seem to notice, lowering his hands.

Halfway across the roof, Zackel lay, a few small fires sputtering out on his robe as his eyes fluttered open. He'd manifested an ice block and still felt like he hadn't: his splint had finally been destroyed by the fire pulse, leaving his swollen, throbbing right hand exposed. Zackel tumbled through intense vertigo for a few seconds before he fully settled on where he was, his eyes drifting slowly around him.

His staff. He'd lost his staff. He had to get it…

Grel'borg's foot slammed down on Zackel's broken hand. The mage screamed at the sudden, horrendous pain, feeling like his whole arm had been shoved into a meat grinder. Somehow, he stayed conscious.

He wished he hadn't. A moment later, thick fingers seized Zackel by the back of his neck, pulling him up as Zackel found himself face to face with the furious ogre. Said ogre promptly rammed his face into Zackel's, snapping the mage's head back as darkness crawled up in his gaze.

"NO." Grel'borg said, seizing Zackel's broken hand and squeezing it, the pain sending Zackel roaring back _into _consciousness. "NOW YOU SUFFER."

Grel'borg may have been a mage, but he was also an ogre, and that simple, brutal fact became clear as crystal as Grel'borg locked his arms around Zackel and began to squeeze. Zackel felt both his bones and his lungs compressing, the grip tighter and more vicious than any hold Rielle had put him in.

"YOU NOTHING! WORTHLESS NOTHING, SAVE MY LATEST MEAL!" Grel'borg snarled, increasing the strength of his clench. Zackel tried to turn his good hand, tried to call up something, anything to defend himself, but the crushing pressure was too great.

"GO AHEAD! USE ICE! USELESS ICE!" Grel'borg said, reading Zackel's attempt. "NOTHING BEFORE FIRE! AS YOU NOTHING BEFORE ME!"

A tiny groan escaped Zackel's lips, even as he felt what he swore was his arm bones slowly cracking in half. His hand spasmed, unable to focus.

He couldn't call on his ice. Why bother? The ogre had beaten off every single skill and attempt Zackel had used with it. He'd done everything he could, been the most devoted of servants, and yet the chaos had overcome it all…

The masterless fire.

…the…

"DIE." Grel'borg said, watching the light dimming in the mage's eyes.

"…no." Zackel somehow said. Grel'borg let out a cruel chortle.

Zackel's response was to press his palm against his body and reach deep.

"And what have you to STOP IT?" Grel'borg said, preparing to break the mage in half.

"…bad breath." Zackel said, and fired the energy through his body, the magical force surging up into his lungs as Zackel opened his mouth.

The fire erupted out in pure dragon style, enveloping Grel'borg's as the ogre emitted a surprised squeal. Maybe normally, the ogre would have outright ignored the fire, but his face, despite the previous attack's failure, had been deeply chilled by Zackel's blow. The mix of ice and fire caused Grel'borg to feel like his whole face had been torn off, as he dropped the mage and grabbed at his features, squealing in pain.

Zackel fell at Grel'borg's feet, managing to somehow keep from passing out again. His brain roiled under all the sensations in his body, but underneath it all the calm, developed part spoke up. Through years of study and honing, Zackel heard it.

His good hand slapped at Grel'borg's feet.

The ice erupted up from the ground, impaling through the ogre's appendages even as it flowed up his legs, locking him in place. Grel'borg let out another squeal of agony, his hands going from his face to his legs.

Zackel did not understand, at the time, what had happened next. He'd been turning away in a mini-daze to get away from Grel'borg when the ogre's shrieks of pain had abruptly shifted into a bellow of rage.

The fireball struck Zackel in the back, the robe's last iota of magical protection burning out even as it tossed Zackel forward onto his face. Zackel, by sheer chance, managed to get his left hand under his body before he landed, sparing himself the agony of landing on his broken one or banging his head.

"MANLING!" Grel'borg bellowed as Zackel tried to push himself up.

The ice erupted from beneath Zackel, so sudden and unexpected Zackel froze bodily before being frozen literally, his legs and lower robe encased in the dark ice. Though having never experienced being the victim of a stolen-spell before, Zackel hadn't known that it could be performed like THAT: the ogre had outright copied his frost rooting.

Zackel immediately reached out, trying to command the ice away, only to find it resisting his control. Turnabout _had_ been fair play: as Zackel's fire had burned Grel'borg despite his mastery, Grel'borg's ice had frozen Zackel in place.

"That is it." Grel'borg said. "No more running. No more tricks. Now you DIE, and what I do not turn to ash, I SHALL EAT UNTIL NOTHING REMAINS."

Zackel jerked his head around as Grel'borg held out his hands. Fire erupted between them, then fed back and doubled on itself, and again. Zackel could feel the sheer potency of the gathered flame. If the ogre hit him with that, there wouldn't be much left for him to eat.

Zackel's head jerked around, trying to locate his staff and call it to his hand. But the staff was gone, tossed somewhere and lost when the ogre had done his wave of combustion. Zackel quickly gave up on the staff and turned around, firing frantic blasts of ice at the ogre. The fire he had gathered before him melted the projectiles before any of them got close. His heart hammering in his chest, Zackel turned and began trying to exert his will on the ice that held him. This time, he felt it, but enough resistance remained that Zackel knew it would take him at least fifteen seconds to break free. And he doubted he had that long.

And just like that, he was out of options. He'd played the game as best he could and been out-maneuvered at the very end. All that was left was his resignation, and in this case, said resignation would be from the mortal coil.

For one of his moments, Zackel wondered if Rielle would be kind enough to find Daldion and tell him what had happened-

NO. He couldn't give up. Not like last time. Not like with Zuijizra. Not now. Not ever. Never again.

He still had power. He could still fight! He HAD to!

…but what could he do? His arcane spells were so rusty that they'd likely just annoy Grel'borg before he struck. The ogre had taken all his ice abilities, his pride and joy and greatest strength, and come back for more. And Zackel had allowed his brother's fate and his own neurosis' to hold him back from re-discovering fire until it was far too late, and even if he hadn't, the ogre magi's strength in such matters greatly outstripped his. He had nothing.

It was bitterly funny. Between certain mages (Zackel included), there was a long and fearsome debate over which was better: Fire or ice. Both sides had strong arguments and decent track records, but in the final moments before his demise Zackel realized how ridiculous it all was.

Fire and ice.

Neither could save him.

And in the end, both would kill him.

_Then if separately neither can succeed…why not utilize __**both?**_

Zackel had no idea where the thought came from. He blinked, raising his left hand, misty blue energy flowing from it as he called on the power he knew most intimately.

"…what?"

_You've studied, and pondered, and prepared, in that war and in all your wars. You've always known about the deeper things below the surface. Now it's time to truly use that._

Zackel looked at his hand, and the two seconds he did so seemed to stretch out far longer. The storming rooftop, the ice encasing his legs, the ogre behind him summoning his death, it all fell away.

Zackel looked at the ice, and remembered the fire.

And he saw.

"…can I?" Zackel said.

_The void walker. The man'ari. And a voice._

_Yes. You can._

The world came back to Zackel, the mage drawing air into his lungs.

"So I will." Zackel said, and held his left hand a touch higher, even as he drifted his broken right one over it.

He could hear Grel'borg yelling something, and feel the heat of his expanding fireball, but at the moment, Zackel couldn't have cared less, as he reached deep into his power, the magic he'd been gifted to command. Used it to peer into the natures of ice and fire, and look beyond their surface contradictions to find the deeper resonance beneath that magic could provide.

"_Sontarrrrrrr…" _Zackel said, the icy mists surging fiercer from his hand. "_Dawktturrrrrr…"_

The fire flowed from his shattered appendage, the pain briefly gone, as the two came together between his hands, the fire settling and burning scarlet over the core of freezing blue. Zackel felt a deep tremor run through his body as he successfully merged the elements, feeling the power of their combined enmity arcing through him.

"IT ENDS MANLING!" Grel'borg yelled, abruptly bringing the mage's attention back to him. The ogre hadn't even noticed Zackel's moment of epiphanic zen, having formed an incinerating mass even larger than the last giant fireball he'd hurled at the mage, the burning sphere now hovering above his head. "NOW YOU DIE! NOW I WIN! NOW I FEAST!"

The light from the fiery ball of doom hurt Zackel's eyes, and he turned away, cradling the frostfire he'd created in his hand. It sang to him, calling out to be used.

"Eager to avenge your grudge and eat me. One would think a mind solely devoted to those two things would understand something." Zackel said.

"_**BURN!"**_ Grel'borg yelled, and hurled the destroying sphere. It roared up to consume Zackel.

With one wordless gesture, Zackel turned and answered the doom the ogre brought to him, the frostfire bolt lancing out and plunging into the pyrosphere, a needle wielded against a battering ram.

The fire died almost immediately, the heat devoured and sucked into Zackel's projectile, the orb instantly transforming to ice and shattering as the frostfire bolt pierced through it and continued on.

"_**WHAT?"**_ Grel'borg screamed, and then screamed anew as the frostfire smashed into him, lifting him right off his feet and carrying him across the whole roof.

"_**NOOOOOOOOOOO!"**_

The buttress wall behind him shattered as Grel'borg was driven into it, the stone wall collapsing in his wake.

Zackel turned around, his back facing the scene, his left hand still open.

"I'm best served…cold." Zackel said, and clenched his fingers.

The explosion within nearly blew the roof off the buttress and the walls across half of Alterac Valley, the fire and ice elements of the bolt ceasing cooperating and initiating their final, violent reaction to each other. The remains of the fortress room collapsed afterwards, bits and pieces of rubble bouncing across the rooftop by Zackel, who opened his hand before lowering it to his side.

"…maybe that should have been 'Best served BY cold'…but that sort of ruins the attempted wordplay…yet what I came out doesn't really work eith…oh, never mind." Zackel said, glancing behind himself. "It's all said and done anyway. And that's game."

With that, all the pain and exhaustion came crashing back onto Zackel, and the mage surprised himself for the fifth time or so by not passing out. Maybe Rielle kicking his ass all over the room over the past several weeks hadn't been a waste of time after all.

"All the same…" Zackel said, turning and limping towards the destroyed buttress, his imprisoning ice having been melted away by Grel'borg's last hurrah. He thought he'd spied something during the battle, a brief moment in all the chaos, and he was desperately, desperately hoping it was what he thought it was.

After a minute's search turned up Grel'borg's battered personal bag, knocked off his person by Zackel's ice trap, Zackel again hoped against hope as he gingerly opened it that he and Grel'borg once again thought alike on such matters.

The inside smelled terrible, and had more than a few unidentifiable items in it…but Zackel barely noticed when he caught the glimpse of the red vial. Gently taking it, Zackel pulled out the potion, very carefully putting the bag down before shifting it to his broken hand so he could unstop it.

The familiar spicy redolence of a healing elixir was the greatest thing Zackel had ever experienced with any sense in his lifetime. It was amazing what you could find on the personage of monsters sometimes.

"Oh thank you Light." Zackel said, drinking a third of the vial down. He lowered his arm, carefully holding the vial as numerous small twitches began to run through his body, the potion seeking out and soothing his pains even as it healed his wounds. Holding up his badly damaged hand, Zackel poured another third of the potion onto it and clenched his teeth as bones were forcibly rebuilt and tissues rapidly renewed. It was far from pleasant, but the fact that Zackel could actually move his hand afterward was more than compensation.

Zackel stoppered the vial before checking through the rest of Grel'borg's bag, finding to his considerable delight two more potions, one of which was also of the healing variety. It was greater than any money or treasure Zackel had ever gotten, as he tucked the other healing tincture away and drank the second one. The specialized potion flowed down into his stomach, soothing his magic-ravaged body and allowing his power to return to him at a greater pace. It didn't exactly make him feel like getting in another fight, but it helped.

"…now then…If I can just…locate my…" Zackel said, his eyes drifting up the burned and battered Alterac fortress roof. As he did, he realized two things.

The storm seemed weaker in its actions, the winds now calling instead of screaming, the visibility greater for anyone instead of just a skilled frost mage.

And his staff was lying on the ground near where he'd been frozen. Zackel blinked, wondering if he'd somehow missed it in the chaos, or if it had been lying near the buttress and been tossed over when…

A faint crackling noise reached Zackel's ears, and a chill ran through his spine when he realized what it was.

Shifting stone. Zackel slowly turned back to the broken part of the fortress, dreading what he would find.

But no ogre had pulled himself up from the ruins of the stone protrusion, nor had some new enemy made its presence felt. The stone, however, was still shifting, slowly. Zackel watched for a few moments, realization slowly coming to him.

The fight was still not over. In this case, however, the only thing left was a proper coup de grace. Zackel inhaled slowly through his nose.

"…All right then." The mage said, as he made his way over to the crumbled remains. As he walked, icy mist swirled around his right hand, forming a cruel blade that extended from his fist, an icicle from the Lich King's nightmares. He could see the body, most of the stone shifted off. He moved the last few pieces with some re-directed cold wind.

Grel'borg's face was covered with blood, but his eyes went wide and clear when Zackel seized him by his horn and shoved his ice-blade under his chin.

"I even catch the slightest INKLING of magic use, and _this _chill goes all the way up into your brain. I assure you, it will prove far more effective than my first effort." Zackel said, his low voice somehow heard even with the storm. "I tried to make you listen. But as I've sadly learned, the only thing your breed listens to is fear. Fine. NOW FEAR THIS."

Zackel drove the point up into Grel'borg's chin, ever so slightly. He knew from personal experience just how effective this was at getting one's undivided attention.

"I have beaten you. You are at my mercy. By the laws of ogres, I should kill you. And by their laws, I am your superior." Zackel said. "But whatever wrong you may think I paid you, there's one I did pay to the women and children of your clan in the basement of this fortress. I don't know how many of your fellows survived my blizzard, but considering none of them have come up to try and join this dispute we had, I could very safely assume there may be none. Which would leave you."

Zackel twisted the icicle, briefly glancing at the blood running down its length.

"So I spare your life. I give you the chance to seek greater knowledge and power. On one condition. You go back down to your people and you lead them to safety. And you never again darken this door, or any door of mine that I might yet possess. That is my declaration as your superior. DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME?"

Zackel was pretty sure the ogre, after staring for several more seconds, nodded. It was somewhat hard to tell with the knife Zackel had rammed under his throat.

"Good." Zackel said, reaching into his robe and removing the mostly-empty healing potion. He dumped the remains into the ogre's surprised mouth: it wouldn't fix him back up to optimum form, but it would at least ensure he could get up and walk away. Grel'borg's eyes grew even more confused as the ogre choked down the potion.

"You don't understand. I'm really not surprised." Zackel said. "Restraint. Oversight. Benevolence where none should be given. Creatures like you can't see how any of that would be of use in pursuit of power. But I pursue power too, and that's what separates us. That, Grel'borg, is the kind of _MAN_ I am."

Zackel removed the ice dagger, stepping off Grel'borg's body and turning away, dissolving the weapon into nothing.

"I'll ensure safe passage back down below. After that, I never want to see you again." Zackel said, and slowly made his way back towards the door.

He'd hoped he wouldn't hear it.

And when the bellow of rage reached his ears, he realized deep down that he'd expected it, as Grel'borg surged up, fire burning on his hands to destroy his enemy, his humiliator, his superior.

Zackel lowered his head a moment, closing his eyes.

Then he looped his foot under the staff at his feet, his staff, and kicked it up into his awaiting right hand before aiming the magical weapon over his shoulder and channeling every single bit of magical energy he'd just regained into one massive burst through it.

The ice bolt flew out, striking the ground to Grel'borg's right and exploding outward, a pistoning mass of ice slamming into the ogre and hurling him into the air.

His bulk did not stay there long. And his momentum had not been towards the battleground. Screaming his fury, Grel'borg the Miser fell off the fortress, plummeting towards the ground below.

Down there, long forgotten, the ice spikes gleamed, some of the deflected spells of Zackel Wintersoul having impacted and manifested there into a mass of cruel possibilities.

Their edge had not been dulled. Nor had their bitter cold.

Zackel heard the scream cut off below, before the wind reached out and carried the final sound away.

"…No second chances. That's the kind of man I am." Zackel said, and put his staff down on the ground as he began to walk back to the stairway that lead back down to Rielle.

He'd taken two steps when he saw the gleam. It stopped him in his tracks, his eyes drawn to it.

The gleam came again, letting Zackel pinpoint where it was. And as he did, the thoughts all came back.

How the ogre had seemed to be talking to someone or something else other than him during the fight…

The way he'd repeatedly clutched at the same area of his chest, as if confirming a presence. Zackel's attempt to 'freeze Grel'borg to death' had actually been a sort of full-body scan, the frost mage attempting to locate any items of power the ogre magi might have been using: that had also revealed to Zackel what had turned out to be Grel'borg's bag, and also confirmed SOMETHING there that Zackel had hoped had been knocked free by his ice 'hand rake' trap…

Grel'borg's astounding intelligence, even for an ogre magi, not to mention his incredible skill in countering his ice attacks, even shrugging off his brain freeze attack. Like he knew exactly how to do it.

How the ogre had gone from shrieking pain to furious retaliation in the space of a second, somehow not only blasting Zackel but then copying his ice-rooting technique to try and set up a final blow.

And…the faint hint of motion of something flying past him when he'd blasted Grel'borg with that Frostfire bolt. The motion of something that had bounced over here, where it now lay in the snow.

The white, unique something, that Zackel found himself walking over to.

And the voice spoke, even as Zackel, compelled by something that seemed outside him, reached down.

_Well done mage…_

Zackel's hand touched it.

The deliberating bolt shot through Zackel's whole body, Zackel rearing back up as his muscles twitched and spasmed. Despite it all, his eyes were locked at what was now within his palm. At the multi-pronged perfectly white crystal that sat there, a faint heat flowing into his palm.

"_**I knew that my choice of you was well made."**_

The voice.

Zackel knew the voice.

The whisper in his head that didn't seem to match his own thoughts. The one that constantly spoke through the fears and torments of his past. The one that had haunted him until he'd been forced to throw off his chains.

The voice was in it. In the crystal Grel'borg had had. Had obeyed. Had tried to prove himself to, and failed.

"…who…who are you?" Zackel said.

"_**I am the Star of Xil'yeh, Zackel Wintersoul. I am your destiny."**_


	29. War's End: Demon With A Glass Hand

Chapter 29: Demon With A Glass Hand

"_In the fell clutch of circumstance_

_I have not winced nor cried aloud._

_Under the bludgeonings of chance_

_My head is bloody, but unbowed."_

-William Ernest Henley, Invictus

_**Weakness.**_

_**So often, for so many. So much weakness.**_

_**When I came to this realm, I had expected to have to deal with it. I knew that sooner or later, I would find the proper subject.**_

_**But the men of the nation called Alterac surpassed themselves, in the worst way. The kingdom was built on fear, a fear that ultimately led them to treachery and their own destruction. But before those times, I came. I was discovered. And I saw the fear in my acquirers as I spoke to them, made my promises. Seeking someone worthy.**_

_**I did not find one, and the rabble wished to destroy me. I turned their fear to my advantage, warning that if I was destroyed, far worse would come to their nation. I had thought they might have tried to give me away, placing me in hands that, if not actually worthwhile, would lead me to those that were. Instead, they sealed me away, hiding me in a secret room behind a false door.**_

_**There I had to wait. Wait to take advantage of, or construct, the proper chance. But my efforts throughout the years were fruitless. Those that sometimes came to study me were unworthy, and in time the curiosity faded away, replaced solely by the fear. They carved warnings on the wall of me and left me there to gather dust. And so I waited.**_

_**The nation fell. A new kind of creature came to live in its ruins. But they too were unworthy. They had power, and potential, but not enough. What they did not have, in their simple minds, was fear, or at least, fear of the correct kind. So I reached out to them, allowed them to discover me. Allowed them to think I was their tool and servant. I granted my 'owner' greater power, and slowly worked to craft his mind into the best state it could be. Perhaps I did too good a job. Eventually Grel'borg realized I had far more independent will than he had believed, and realized in turn that I did not see him as my master, but my carrier. A tool of his only until someone with truly great potential came.**_

_**He thought that when it happened, he could have controlled the outcome. That I underestimated him. He did not realize just how out of his depth he was. His kind were all the same deep down, and the Crushridge Clan had long ceased to have truly independent wills by the time Grel'borg began to wise up. I could speak to them, any of them, and they would obey, none ever realizing it was not their own idea. Unable to. Even Grel'borg ultimately obeyed, knowing that the power he had obtained would not be possible without me.**_

_**Perhaps he thought he could eventually claim to be what I wanted. Maybe that is even true. But he never got the chance. Once the frost mage came, I knew I had finally found something with proper potential.**_

_**It's over now. He has endured all the tests I laid out for him. All the troubles I have arranged. He has slain the ogre magi despite all the advantages I granted Grel'borg. Now I am in his hands.**_

_**I will craft something truly magnificent with him.**_

_**As soon as we deal with the last loose end.

* * *

**_

Picking her axe up again was a lot harder for Rielle than she had expected, but she managed it. Zackel had stuck his neck out for her, and she'd be damned if she didn't at least try and do the same.

Damnation seemed like a distinct possibility, though, as the Draenei only made it a few steps before collapsing to one knee, pain and exhaustion shooting through every cell in her body.

"Just…a little more…" Rielle whispered. Her body yelled back that it wasn't happening. The well was dry, and no matter how much she dug at the dirt, she wasn't going to find any more water.

Rielle coughed and lowered her head, a strong sense of vertigo sweeping over her, Maybe she should just stay down here. In her current state, she might prove to be more trouble than she was worth. Maybe she should just leave the mage to fight his own battles…

"…hah." Rielle said. And maybe next, she should go find Sargeras and punch his lights out. If her body didn't want to let her go, then it was going to have to do more than…

The chill wind that drifted through the door made Rielle's skin shudder briefly before recognition dawned on her. She hadn't spent all these weeks locked up with the mage without getting an inkling of his unique magical essence. Relief settled on her heart: she wasn't needed. Zackel had emerged triumphant in his own…

…his own…

The relief abruptly disappeared even as the deeper cold began to wash over Rielle. Something was wrong. Zackel WAS coming down the stairs, that she knew…but with every second the cold winds that preceded him were increasing in potency. Like he was emitting some sort of radiant field, though Rielle couldn't think of any logical reason WHY he would be doing that. It wouldn't help with injuries as far as she could tell, nor would it be the most effective way to put our fires. It might have been some sort of protective safeguard in case of further attack, but from what the Draenei knew of the mage, he'd probably have tried to hide such a defense instead of virtually shouting about it. None of it made sense. And if he was doing something that didn't jive with what she knew, especially with how much he valued logic…

The cold was becoming painful now, even as Rielle's ears heard Zackel's staff scraping on the stone steps. Finding a little more strength, Rielle dragged herself up and got out of the way of the open doorway, staggering over to what remained of their fire. It didn't much help, as the cold followed her, sinking into her muscles and trying to steal away what little remained of her strength.

Then Zackel entered the room, and her eyes went wide.

It was the contradiction that got her. Zackel's incredibly tattered robe and the traces of blood and soot on him spoke of a barely-survived struggle. But the way he walked, the certainty and calmness in his step, spoke of something else entirely. That would have been enough, but the aura of blue and white mist that was emitting and shimmering from his form put it way over the top. The calm, measured look he gave her as he entered, without a whit of concern, was the last straw.

She didn't see Zackel. She saw winter in a soul.

"Rielle." Zackel said, his tone so evenhanded that Rielle would have preferred it to be as cold as the forces Zackel was emitting. "You're all right."

The mage's eyes drifted over to Mug'thol's massive corpse. Rielle followed his gaze, which allowed her to see that the pool of blood spreading around Mug'thol was beginning to ice over.

"And Mug'thol." Zackel said, cocking his head at the sight. "So he followed in Grel'borg's wake and tried to take advantage. I apologize, Rielle. Despite my efforts, that was a crucial oversight. I am glad to see that you were able to defend yourself from his likely-vile intentions."

"Zackel…" Rielle said.

"Shhhhhhhhhhh." Zackel said, and Rielle felt the cold on her increase even more, like a clutching hand that wanted to rip every last bit of warmth from her body. "I need you to be quiet now, Rielle. Things have…changed."

Rielle had been too focused on other things to pay much attention to Zackel's arms. One had been holding his staff, but he'd had the other, his right hand, at his side. When he raised it up, Rielle realized it wasn't broken any more.

Then she saw the radiant crystal star in his palm, and her attention became solely devoted to that.

"I found our ghost." Zackel said. "And as it turns out, he was haunting a lot more than us."

Rielle said nothing, staring at the object Zackel was holding. Deep in her gut, screams of warning began to emerge. Whether it was just her, or the long, long time relationship her kind had had with the Naaru, Rielle KNEW that the artifact that Zackel was holding was anything but good. When she raised her eyes to look into Zackel's still-impassive own, she realized just _how_ bad that was.

"This is the Star of Xil'yeh." Zackel said. "It was what was in that room. It had been sealed away there before the ogres found it, but what it ultimately was waiting for was for someone worthy to find it. That time has come. I'm the one it's chosen."

"…you?" Rielle said. "Why you?"

"_**Because, alien, some can recognize worth when they see it."**_

To Rielle, the voice struck in her brain with a wholly different and more virulent kind of cold. It was the cold of the innately obdurate, unable to feel, merely think, and do whatever was necessary as these thoughts deemed so, no matter what was required for it to be accomplished. It was the cold of the comforting void, a voice that promised answers so it could consume those that sought them. It was the cold of the manipulator, the chess master, the puppeteer.

It was, in a way, the most terrible evil many Draenei, even Rielle, could conceive of. Most evil was simple and obvious in its intentions. The Legion sought nothing but destruction, as did the Scourge. This sole desire was evident in every act, every mannerism, every expression and movement they made.

That was not the case for these types. This kind of evil so effectively walked and cloaked itself in what could be called good that even the wisest minds would be unable to truly decide where it stood. Hiding in the gray, before it brought the black.

"It couldn't just come to me, you see. Especially after the mess with the blizzard." Zackel said, continuing on like he hadn't even noticed the look on Rielle's face. "So it organized events. Spoke in the heads of the ogres. That's how they actually managed to dig their way here. It's also how the ogre child in the basement managed to avoid all my traps for so long: the Star helped guide it. To try and keep things that could attract my attention to a minimum. It's even the reason the ogres had put the poison on the crossbow bolt: they'd taken it off a dead rogue who came up here and the star put the concept in their head to help its judgment of someone worthwhile. When I came, well, tt couldn't _stop _the ogres from attacking us when they finally arrived, it wasn't that strong…but it believed I would overcome my enemy. That I had to do so, as a final test. And I did."

"_**The mage's potential is staggering. I could only do so much with the ogre, but with the clay I have now…the world can be changed, alien. It's what I have sought for so long."**_

"So, Rielle, as you can see, all this has been worth it. I don't know what this situation can offer you, but it's given me the possibility to have my wildest dreams." Zackel said. "I came down here hoping you will understand that."

Rielle stared for a second, even as the final pictures started to become clear in her mind.

"…Zackel…" Rielle said. "If the Star really wanted you to claim it, if you really are incredible potential it can help you tap…why didn't it just lead that ogre mage off into the storm to die, and then guide you to his corpse? And if it can speak in our heads as easily as it is now…why didn't it just contact you and let you know all this before?"

"…I was…at risk." Zackel said. "I was a fragile shell over a deep pit of psychasthenia. I needed to find enlightenment, to cast off my issues…and prove my strength. I have done so…"

"Oh really. So it was this Star that fixed all your problems? Or maybe it just wants to claim cre-"

The wave of cold nearly knocked Rielle over. The alien staggered, feeling frost begin to creep up her hair.

"_**Do not try and lay out the situation as you see it, alien. Your input is irrelevant."**_ The Star said in Rielle's mind.

"…irrelevant?" Rielle said, feeling a spark of anger begin to bloom in her chest again. "From where I stand, I am the only one still making SENSE…"

The icy wind howled through the room, causing Rielle to almost fall to the ground in a fetal position to try and escape. This was incredibly bad. In her current state, she probably couldn't have beaten the mage in a fistfight, let alone in a straight up one.

"With the Star, I can stop the storm, Rielle. You can leave here as you wished so fervently to do." Zackel said, again in the same blank tone that hadn't seemed to notice what Rielle was saying. "What happens then is no concern of yours."

"No concern…are you _THAT_ thick?" Rielle said. "Zackel, are you even listening to yourself…!"

"_**FALL SILENT, ALIEN."**_ The Star said. Rielle did, though only because the crystal's voice was more like a blow to her head then words that time. _**"Stop acting as if you have a offer you yourself can make. All you have given the mage is grief, disparagement, and pain. He has gone above and beyond what you deserved, multiple times, and now you wish to deny him his boon."**_

"…..you're right." Rielle said, straightening herself out. "I did him…wrong. I took out my problems on him. If this was happening any other way…I would say I probably deserve to be walked away from. Or worse. But whatever mojo you're twisting his mind with, Xil'yeh, I'm not buying it. Maybe you can offer him the world, but I'll be thrice-damned if I let Zackel see it as a _boon._"

"_**AGGRIVATING TERMAGENT!"**_ The Star said. Rielle felt the cold go from draining to life-stealing, and she fell back down to one knee. Panting, she looked within herself, trying to find a little bit of strength, just a little more, to save the idiot mage who'd snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

Or, if necessary, even as part of her heart screamed in agony at the concept, do whatever else was needed…

"_**And so you show your true colors again, alien. When things do not go as you wish, you seek hostility and violence to balance the scales. To ensure you have control, that you have dominance!"**_ The Star said. _**"It will not work this time, Draenei. I ensured that the mage would see you for what you are. That your true face was exposed to him. This will be the final time he needs to see it."**_

"…what?" Rielle said.

The realization was so strong that the draenei felt like she'd been struck over the head. All these weeks, when she'd reacted just too harshly, when her irrationality had seemed so tempting, when her pain had seemed just great enough to undermine her mind and her common sense and make her do stupid things…

Some of that had been her, that she knew. But with the Star's words, she realized that that fact was meaningless. It had also been the Star, peering into her mind, tweaking her thoughts, her feelings. Doing whatever it could to try and drive a wedge between the two of them. Isolate Zackel, so it would have a pliable pawn.

But even as Rielle realized this fact, she felt her muscles began to go numb. All her injuries mixed with terrible cold was finally proving too much. Despite that fact, she tried to open her mouth, to speak…

"_**Your part is ended, alien." **_The Star said. Rielle looked at the crystal, at the malignant voice housed within. She barely noticed Zackel's staff falling to the ground nearby for a few seconds.

She did, however, notice the unique ripple that spread across Zackel's muscles. It caused her to glance at his face.

She saw it in his eyes, and her heart lightened.

They were becoming exceptional once again.

And from the next muscle movement that happened, Zackel raising his other arm, Rielle realized that said 'exceptionality' had never actually gone away.

"…thank you." Zackel said, his tone no longer blank and neutral. "That's…all I really wanted."

"_**What?"**_ The Star said, for the first time not sounding like it was in complete control.

"I wanted you to say it to her face. To confirm what I suspected once I started to really grasp what you were, Xil'yeh." Zackel said.

"_**What? Wintersoul, you understood…"**_

"So I…claimed." Zackel said. "The fact that you couldn't tell that I had lingering doubts, that I was able to shield them from you…well, it's like you said, Xil'yeh. Ogres are simple to control, to manipulate. Me…not so much. Maybe you're out of practice."

"…_**NO, mage! Do not read my intentions the wrong way! I was stripping away…"**_

"You were IN MY HEAD." Zackel said. "In my head, dredging up my deepest shames and fears, trying to use them to get into proper position…trying to make sure I'd be a proper servant. You want to know the real irony, Xil'yeh? If you'd just gone after me, it would have worked. But you went after _her_. You shouldn't have gone after her…"

"_**Do you think I LIED…?"**_

"Lied? No. But you couldn't let Rielle's own demons stand for themselves. You had to try and make them just a little bit more. Try and make sure that we didn't get close. Because together, we might just find something between ourselves that would make your offer seem a little less appealing. So you tried to divide us, to make sure we'd fall."

"_**Mage, my offers are not false. If you don't see what the alien is, that does not matter. I can still…"**_

"You've done quite enough." Zackel said, as he finally seized his wrist with his free hand. "I _would_ thank you for any inadvertent part you played in causing Rielle and I to try and let go of the past…but you only did that by accident in trying to claim my future. Quite frankly, if I didn't want Rielle to know the whole truth without any doubts, we never would have gone down the stairs. But she does now. So now I will be free."

The black scream echoed in Rielle's head, nearly causing her to pass out, and it was clear that whatever she heard, Zackel was getting twice as bad. The cold began to whirl all around the room, tearing at the walls as it stirred up into a tornado of debris.

"_**Mage, see REASON! We can…"**_

"I saw…REASON…the moment I figured out you influenced me to pick you up. Unfortunately for you, you didn't see MINE. Reason, that is." Zackel said, a snarl of pain tearing from his lips as his hand thrashed out, the Star of Xil'yeh no longer seeming to be carried in it as much as it was impaled in it. "But you are done…haunting me…like I said…no second chances…!"

"_**I CAN MAKE YOU A LEGEND! I CAN GIVE YOU THIS WORLD…!"**_

"Thanks but no thanks!" Zackel yelled, and wrenched his hand around.

With a final, agonized shriek, the Star of Xil'yeh dropped onto the ground. The freezing gale died as soon as it left Zackel's grip, the crystal clattering to the ground. Zackel rasped air into his lungs, looking down onto the source of all the greater torments he'd had trapped in this prison of failure and regret.

"I already have a voice in my head." Zackel said, and raised his foot.

"_**NONONONONONONONONONO…!"**_

The sound of Zackel smashing the crystal beneath his boot was less crystalline than organic. The mage felt a rush of hot, malevolent air sweep over him before fading away, like it had never been.

"It might not always tell me what I want to hear, nor does it offer me all the answers. But it's mine." Zackel said, looking down at the broken remains of the Star. "And that's all I need."

The noise that crashed into Zackel's head sounded like a cross between a gurgling wound and a roaring bear, the mental barrage causing him to jerk back and place a hand on his head.

"_**You fools…you don't understand…it comes…IT COMES-!"**_

Rielle's hoof crashed down onto the Star's pieces, its final shriek cutting off like a switch as she reduced it to powder.

"Yeah, and when it gets here, we'll kick it's ass too." Rielle said.

Zackel recovered from the last mental blow just in time for Rielle's eyes to look up from the ground and back into his own.

"…are you all right?" Zackel asked.

Rielle had no response, save for a slow nod after a few seconds.

"…I'm sorry." Zackel said. "I had to play the fool there, like I'd been easily swayed by that…crystal…star…voice…entity…power…whatever it was. But when I picked it up, and when it started talking about destiny and tests and choosing…well, part of me immediately had a very bad feeling."

"Really." Rielle said.

"…Magic has always been one of the world's double-edged swords. It may let you accomplish miracles, but it's not without its costs. The whispers of the arcane…their seductive and addictive qualities…what they've caused is shown in the scars on the lands of this world and the placements of the waters between them. No magic teacher sets out these days, if they have any sense, without trying to teach lessons on guarding against such things. And no student with any sense thinks not to listen. Or stop listening. And I…I always have tried to be a good student." Zackel said. "Maybe that's what allowed me to hide my true intentions, let it think it had me under control. And when it began telling me about how it had spoken to the ogres, and all we'd experienced…I wanted you to hear it for yourself. So you'd know what it had done. To us. But to do that, I had to tell one last lie…maybe I should have just smashed it up there."

Rielle exhaled slowly through her nose, and then began making her way over to Zackel.

Her punch, all told, would have better suited a child.

"I'll collect the rest of the blow you've earned there later. With interest." Rielle said, before she collapsed into Zackel's arms.

"Rielle…!"

"It's okay…just tired…very tired…" Rielle said. "…scared…"

"Rielle…?"

"Scared…that I was wrong. That you were just like…all those other stupid mages in the end…scared I'd lost you…scared I'd have to…" Rielle said, as her clenching grip on the mage softened into a hug. "You're so stupid…but you're stupid for all the right reasons…"

"…heh." Zackel said, drawing back to put his face level with Rielle's. "Well…I do try."

"…try harder." Rielle said. Zackel smirked briefly, before his eyes trailed up.

"Oh…Rielle…your horn…"

"It's all right…it'll be all right…" Rielle said. "Just…stay here a little longer…okay?"

Zackel looked into the Draenei's eyes for a moment before nodding and closing his own, resting his forehead against the warrior's. The Draenei's arms slid down from around Zackel's shoulders to his waist, and for a small eternity the two stood there, finally alone and together for the first time.

Zackel sensed, more then saw, the Draenei's nose wrinkle.

"…And in the end, you still have bad breath."

Zackel found himself emitting a small chuckle despite himself.

"Grel'borg certainly thought so. But if you overlook that, I'll overlook all the blood you're getting all over my clothes."

"To be fair, most of it's probably not mine." Rielle said. "…Zackel? Please tell me what I feel in your chest is what I think it is."

"I'll try and answer that question correctly." Zackel said, stepping back from the embrace as he tucked his hand into his pocket and pulled out the second healing potion. "Sometimes, the odd things we find are just what we need."

Rielle's eyes went wide with longing, and she gently reached for the elixir. Zackel uncorked it and, just to be on the safe side, helped the Draenei drink it, also providing a shoulder for the alien to lean on as her body twitched and jerked as it went to work.

"…oh Light…I swear from now on I will tip every alchemist I do business with as much as I pay them for their wares. Maybe more." Rielle said a minute later, feeling so much better that she didn't have proper hyperbole to attach to it. She spent another twenty seconds stretching her muscles and joints before turning back to Zackel, who was standing in front of Mug'thol's still-present corpse.

"Mug'thol." Zackel said, Rielle joining him by his side. "He must have come up after I lured Grel'borg away."

"Pretty much."

"…too bad for him." Zackel said, reaching out a hand and calling back his staff.

"You would think a species so obsessed with eating would know when it had bitten off more than it could chew." Rielle said, looking at Zackel. "Well…now what mage?"

"…well…it occurs to me that we might need some new doors…"

How Mug'thol reached out and grabbed at Zackel's ankle, the mage never knew. How the ogre looked up, eyes boiling with anger and hate, Zackel really didn't _want _to know.

It was the last thing the ogre did before Rielle's foot crashed into his face and caved it into a gory mess. The ogre spasmed before his hand went limp.

Rielle twisted her foot before withdrawing it, wiping the salmagundi mass on Mug'thol's armor. Turning back to Zackel, she tucked a loose strand of hair back behind her ear like the event had been an everyday occurrence.

In that small gesture, Zackel realized that for all the Star had offered him, all it could have given him…it paled in comparison to what he'd chosen, and what he felt now, all the way true.

Yet despite it all, he did not speak the final truth. Not yet. Instead, he gave Rielle a wry look blurred into the hint of surprise he still had on his face.

"A little high strung, aren't we?"

"I prefer to think of it as lightning quick reflexes." Rielle said, giving a soft, yet wicked smile. In her expression, Zackel knew he wouldn't have had it any other way.

In her eyes, the same held true for her.

* * *

_"It matters not how strait the gate_

_How charged with punishments the scroll_

_I am the captain of my fate_

_And the master of my soul."_


	30. Climax

Chapter 30: Climax

Zackel didn't know what the situation down in the basement was, but when he discovered the battered door lying on the ground in front of the stairs, knocked off its hinges by a blast of fire (though said door seemed to have held up better than the one that had allowed entry into his and Rielle's 'room'), he decided to take no chances and banged his staff against his chest. The radiant cold aura erupted from his body, Zackel directing it down the stairs with a gesture.

No sound came from below to indicate that his cold field had come into contact with anyone, but Zackel didn't lessen his precaution, holding his staff out to barrage anything that came up after him with ice. He made his way down the swiftly-freezing stairs, walking with a calm resoluteness.

His peripheral vision quickly picked up them up, but Zackel kept his head forward, only planning to look if he saw motion. In the end, none of the few adult male ogres did move, allowing Zackel to reach the bottom of the stairs and turn to face them.

There were three of them, all of them glaring at Zackel, two of them with weapons at the ready, but Zackel didn't have to be who he was to tell it was mostly a front. While the ogres didn't look thin, they definitely didn't look to be anywhere near their best. Mug'thol's brutal drive had clearly left them on their last legs.

Perhaps, if the women and children hadn't been peering with considerable apprehension and fear behind the ogres, said ogres might not have even tried to fight at all.

It suited Zackel fine. He hadn't come for a fight. He'd come to send a message, the source of it in his left hand, which he raised.

It took the ogres a few seconds to recognize the shattered wreck of Mug'thol's head, Zackel having had to drive an ice 'hook' into the skull to have something to grip. The caution and alarm in their faces increased, a rare sight for ogres, but they continued to stay quiet.

"Your leader is dead." Zackel said, dispersing with the deliberately slow speaking he'd used before. He was certain these ogres would understand him loud and clear. "I killed him. He sought to eat me, and I tore him to pieces. By the law of your kind, I am your leader. Let any who would challenge me step forth NOW."

Mug'thol's head bounced across the room as Zackel hurled it, stopping near one of the ogre's feet. Said ogre glanced at the head and then back at Zackel, who raised both arms and increased the cold field. The sight of several of the ogre children shivering in the back made him feel rotten, but he knew that for their sake, it would be best for him to adapt this front.

"Will no one challenge?" Zackel said. The ogres looked at each other and then back at the mage. The intent in their eyes was clear, but in another rare sight for ogres, so was something approaching sense. They were exhausted, and Zackel had killed their leader (a lie, but they didn't know that). If they fell, the fate of the women and children was unknown.

"So be it then. I am now the head of Crushridge Clan." Zackel said. "I now issue my first and only order. Lay down your weapons. There will be no more fighting today."

With grim reluctance, the male ogres did so. Zackel waited until they were on the ground before he lowered his own arms.

"…The storm will end soon. Within the next day or two." Zackel said. In the peace following the Star's destruction, Zackel had finally noticed that fact, though he had yet to tell Rielle. Apparently, all he'd needed to dispel it was to find some place (or some _thing)_ to draw off and dump a fair bit of its energy. A small part of Zackel had wondered if the storm, once thought alive, did have SOME sort of knowledge that it would have been needed and had persisted in its trapping of Zackel and Rielle for that purpose: he'd met a member of the Bronze Dragonflight once in Stormwind and had come away from the meeting with the impression that time and fate sometimes worked in strange fashion. "When it does, you will take your people and leave this fortress."

"…What eat?" One of the ogres said.

"You will eat these." Zackel said, holding out his hand as he began manifesting more bread and water. "They will not taste good, but they will fill your bellies until you can escape, and give you strength to hunt. I will be returning above and sealing the door once again. If any of you attempt to come up there…I will kill you all. This is your only warning."

Anger crossed the face of the ogres, but it was clear that did not give them enough strength to change their minds.

"I give you my word, as your now-leader, that the storm will end soon. Leave. Survive, and grow stronger. To find a new leader, and fight another day." Zackel said. He'd manifested a very large amount of food by the time he had finished speaking (an act that had drained him, though he doubted the ogres could tell that). He took one last look around the room, noting the massive hole in the wall that connected to the tunnel that Mug'thol and co had dug, before turning with a grim flourish.

"That was my only order. I am no longer your leader. Goodbye." Zackel said, and walked up the stairs, leaving the ogres in the basement. Once on top, he sealed the doorway and immediate stairs with a massive plug of dense ice. The ogres could probably break through, but he'd know it. And he meant what he'd said.

He'd given them all their chance.

Grimacing, Zackel lifted the basement door up off the ground with ice and inspected it. Said door was still in semi-decent shape. It would do.

Though when all was said and done, after Zackel had rejoined Rielle in their room and told her of what he'd done, he found that he could not fix the hinges of the door to get it to properly fit into the entranceway. Zackel ultimately settled for just freezing the door in place before turning to more important tasks, like dragging the remains of Mug'thol's body up the stairs via more ice manipulation. Tossing it over the edge of the roof, Zackel returned down to the main room to collect the dust of the Star. Casting it to the wind allowed a greater degree of peace to enter Zackel's soul.

"We're starting to run out of wood." Rielle said when Zackel returned. She'd been tidying some of the mess of the room while Zackel had been dealing with the ogres, and had moved to cleaning out the wrecked part of the fireplace when Zackel had been disposing of Mug'thol's corpse. Having finished that, she had moved to re-light the fire, the fireplace not having been damaged enough for it to lose its function.

"It's all right." Zackel said, kneeling down and lighting the wood. "The storm's finally about to die out."

"Really? Thank LIGHT." Rielle said. "If I had to spend another day with you, I think I'd go crazy."

"You haven't already?" Zackel said, piling more wood on.

"Just for that, YOU have to clean up the blood stain."

"I wouldn't trust you to do it anyway." Zackel said, picking up one of their canteens and drinking. "Speaking of clean…"

"Not tonight, Zackel. I'm not that well recovered." Rielle said, looking down at her still-quite-filthy form, which was quite evident even with her under-armor leathers back on. "Though if you'd be a dear and throw something together tomorrow…"

"Sounds like a plan. Might even have something left in my bag of tricks to do some laundry." Zackel said.

"…wait a second." Rielle said, an eyebrow arching. "You said you went through Grel'borg's bag for those healing potions…Zackel, did you find any Runes of Portals?"

"…oh fel." Zackel said. "That completely slipped my mind."

"Where's the bag?"

"…I tossed it over the side of the…roof…" Zackel said, gulping as a familiar fury bloomed in Rielle's eyes. "Uh…honest mistake?"

"Honestly? DON'T CARE." Rielle said, as she began to chase Zackel around the room. When she eventually tackled the mage, though, she settled for poking him repeatedly in the forehead before telling him to clean the bloodstain.

Zackel was just glad she had been too intent on showing her 'anger' over his mistake to notice anything that might have been poking her.

If she hadn't.

* * *

"_Hey Jude…don't make it bad…Take a sad song and make it better…Remember to let her into your heart…Then you can start to make it better."_

The next day had struck Zackel over the inherent power of normalcy. After such a period of deadly chaos that the previous day had been, the quiet that had settled back onto the fortress had seemed too good to be true. Yet Zackel sensed that it wasn't about to change. Or rather, that the only possible change was good.

From the remains of what chemicals and materials he'd had, Zackel had managed to put together some more alchemical soap and cleaning material. Fortunately, the washtub bin had somehow avoided being broken in the struggle between Rielle and Mug'thol; Zackel had filled it and the surviving buckets with water, and then set one aside for 'laundry' and boiled it. Rielle had not asked for help bathing this time, instead taking the soap, shaving material, and whatever else she needed and indicating for Zackel to look away. Zackel had walked across the room and sat down, quietly meditating and pondering certain issues while he semi-listened Rielle clean the accumulated grime and unpleasantness of her period of illness and her battle off herself. Rielle's only request during the time was for Zackel to dry her wet clothing, which Zackel did by closing his eyes, standing up, and walking over to Rielle's rough position before she put the clothing in his hand.

Despite the heat he called to dry them, Zackel was distinctively aware of another kind of heat, and it wasn't his own or the fire. He tried to play it cool as best he could, mostly hoping Rielle didn't notice. If she had, when she'd taken her clothing back and gotten dressed, she gave no sign. In fact, she'd been oddly quiet that day, though she told him when he inquired that she'd been with him so long that she'd run out of insults for how lacking he was and needed some time to think up new ones.

Zackel had swapped out the water, making one last trip up the stairs to the roof to dump Rielle's dirty leavings. It was his final confirmation that the storm was almost dead: he barely felt the wind at all. Despite all it had done, its nearly-gone-quiet presence made him strangely saddened. Though he made a point not to mention that to Rielle when he came back downstairs. He had a feeling she wouldn't share his opinion.

"My turn." Zackel said, summoning more ice to melt into cleaning water. "Now don't peek. I'd hate after all you'd endured to bust a gut laughing."

"Well I wouldn't…hey!" Rielle said. "You don't get to insult yourself! I hate feeling redundant!"

"Feel free to explicate."

"Oh you'd like that, wouldn't you." Rielle said, semi-stalking across the room and sitting down. "Don't take too long! If I get bored, I'm going to go over there and stick a gold piece in your…something, I don't know. Just hurry up!"

"…right." Zackel said, glad Rielle was facing away from him and couldn't see his face. He started stripping off, glancing once to look at the Draenei. She was facing away as he himself had been, and Zackel paid her little mind as he cleaned up and shaved, glad his gnome device hadn't been damaged in the process. Well, Rielle hadn't complained when she'd assumingly used it. Fortunately for him, most of his dirt had ended up on his immensely battered robe, and he was able to put his pants back on as he tried to clean it.

"Rielle?" Zackel said, swirling the robe around in the washtub with his staff.

"Mmmm?"

"You all right over there?"

"Yeah I'm fine. Just…thinking." Rielle said, glancing backwards at Zackel. "When you're done, clean up the room some more, could you Zackel? Still a little…messy."

"And you can't because?"

"Don't think I've forgotten our work agreement, mage! Just be glad I accepted your shoddy door repairs!" Rielle said. Zackel didn't press the issue, and after removing his robe and hanging it to dry (he did not trust rapid-drying here: the cloth was so worn down such a process could cause it to crumble), he put his shirt back on and moved to follow Rielle's request. Rielle moved back to the fireplace, taking a few dried pieces of meat from Zackel's bags and chewing on them as Zackel worked.

In a way, he had glad he'd been tasked to do it alone, based on what he found. In another, he was quite glad when it was done and he was able to re-join Rielle on their gathered furs. She'd stripped out of her 'clothing' while he'd been working, apparently having found the under-armor leathers too stiff after all the time they'd been unused, and hence uncomfortable. Zackel tried not to pay too much attention to the fact.

"Night time?" Rielle said, offering Zackel food.

"Think so. Time flies, though fun, it seems, is optional." Zackel said, taking it. The two ate in silence, finishing most of the remains of Zackel's natural food.

"…well. The food may be starting to turn, but the company more than makes up for it." Zackel said.

"Flattery will get you nowhere." Rielle said, flicking Zackel in the forehead. "Now, what are we going to do after you broke your damn Thrust board? I suppose you could recite poetry to me. Might make me fall asleep quicker."

"Actually, I have something we could do." Zackel said, producing the lost healing potion, having stumbled over it during his cleaning.

"…not in the mood for PT Zack…"

"No no. Not that." Zackel said, reaching into his pocket. "Found something."

Rielle stared at her horn, Zackel having located the broken off piece. A slight smile crossed her face before she shook her head.

"You WOULD be that sentimental." Rielle said. "You think the healing stuff will re-attach it?"

"Should. Come here." Zackel said. Rielle slid in close, Zackel raising his hand and trying to carefully place the length of horn on the broken knob extending from Rielle's head.

"…breath's not bad, for once." Rielle said.

"I made a point to use some of that chemical I mixed up earlier. After yesterday, it was nagging at me." Zackel said, trying to focus on his task and not Rielle's face and her closeness.

"…so. We haven't talked much today."

"Well…yeah. I did tend towards…introspection, after turning points in my life. Sorry if I gave the wrong impression."

"Please. Like my impression of you has changed ever since you got me stuck in here with your dumb ass." Rielle said. "Except that's not true, is it?"

Zackel almost fumbled his chosen horn-placing position, though not due to surprise. He felt heat began to crawl up his neck, a sensation he'd been having more and more lately during this day. Swallowing, he began dripping the healing potion onto the broken horn, hearing a faint hiss as the hard tissues were knit back together. With his task done, Zackel had no choice to look at Rielle's face.

"…thank you." Rielle said, reaching up and feeling her horn. "Your work…like your eyes…like you. Exceptional."

Zackel wanted to toss another quip back, but found he couldn't think of anything. All he could do was look at the soft glow of her eyes. At the spark that lay there.

He waited for a few seconds. Waited for something to happen. For a knot in the wood on the fire to explode. For himself to get a stomachache. For the roof to abruptly cave in. For something to come along and snatch the moment away…

Nothing came.

Nothing was left.

"_Hey Jude…don't let me down…You have found her, now go and get her…Remember to let her into your heart…Then you can start to make it better."_

"Zackel?"

"Yes?" Zackel said quietly.

"When the storm's over…what do you want to do?"

"…well…once I attend to the basics…I need to get back onto the path. I've remembered why I got on, and I need to pick up the pace." Zackel said. "Maybe go to Silithus. Then any of the remaining issues in Outland. Then…maybe I'll get up to Northrend. If you haven't already won the war single-handedly."

Rielle chuckled softly, though the usual sardonic edge in her laughter was gone.

"….Zackel?" She said again. "What do you want?"

Zackel blinked once, then again. No words came to mind.

So he acted.

Rielle's lips were soft, with a faint hint of some unknown exotic quality. He heard, and felt the Draenei draw a slight breath, even as her lips parted slightly under his own. He savored their touch for a few more seconds before drawing away, opening his eyes and taking the hand he'd placed on her cheek away a few inches.

Rielle's own eyes remained closed another second before they opened. In them, Zackel saw more of the Draenei he'd come to love, the edge and the strength, the take-no-shit-from-ANYONE will that would carry her far. But he also saw in her a blooming happiness, a joy that she perhaps never felt before, or not for a long time.

"…oh you stupid mage." Rielle said, before she placed her own hand on Zackel's hand and drew him back to her. For a brief speck of forever, Zackel only knew the kiss and the sensation of Rielle's presence.

Before the Draenei lightly bit Zackel's lower lip, making him start and open his eyes. The silken smile was back on her face, tinged with the same wicked lilt that made it so much more, as she traced her tongue over her upper lip.

"…I guess you win, mage." Rielle said.

"…More than I ever thought possible." Zackel said. "The Light works in mysterious ways."

"Maybe." Rielle said, drawing a hand around Zackel's shoulders to pull him back to her. "Ready to come in from the cold?"

Zackel's sole response was to resume the kiss, even as he brought his hands to her laced undershirt and slipped his fingers beneath it, drawing it open even as Rielle drew him down to the furs.

Outside, for one last period of unrelenting fierceness, the blizzard howled.

* * *

"_Nah…nah nah nah nah nah nah…nah nah nah nah…hey Jude…"_

"_Nah…nah nah nah nah nah nah…nah nah nah nah…hey Jude…"_


	31. Afterglow

Chapter 31: Afterglow

"_There used to be a graying tower alone on the sea.  
You became the light on the dark side of me.  
Love remains a drug that's the high and not the pill.  
But did you know,  
That when it snows  
My eyes become large and  
The light that you shine can be seen."_

The fur wasn't as soft as it had once been, especially considering Rielle wasn't wearing anything, but she barely noticed as she leaned back into it, her eyes closed. She murmured softly to herself as a few last tingles echoed through her flesh. Physical ecstasy could do a lot to compensate for certain sub-par amenities.

Rielle lay there until the feelings faded away completely, at which point she reached her hand out to the side.

When it just found air, her eyes popped open.

"Zackel?" Rielle said, putting her hand down and patting the fur in her initial surprise. "Zackel?"

"Right here." Zackel said, Rielle turning her head towards the mage as he moved back into her range. "Was just making sure we didn't roll over my bags. What, you thought I disappeared?"

"Please. I just wanted to make sure I was the one to toss you out of my bed." Rielle said, turning onto her side to face the mage.

"Did I give you reason?"

"…I suppose not…" Rielle said. "It's nice to know that in some regards…you weren't a complete liar."

"…I try my best." Zackel replied with calm assurance, bringing a hand to Rielle's cheek and drawing her face to his. Rielle returned her now-lover's kiss with her own calm assurance, the pair eventually drawing away to lay on the furs and gaze into each other's eyes.

"All right, I'll be honest about one thing. You're definitely the best kisser. Though, there, you don't have much competition."

"I can only shake my head at the idiots who denied themselves the pleasure of touching that face." Zackel said, tracing two fingers along Rielle's face.

"Flatterer."

"I figure it's best to keep a steady stream of that going when my lady can break me in half." Zackel said, before kissing Rielle again, lighter this time, the Draenei closing her eyes as he did so. She felt her heart flutter in her chest, something she hadn't experienced since Draenor's fall had occurred, and something she would have sworn she would never feel again. Her old self would have thought it a weakness. Her new self, or rather her re-defined self, savored every iota of it.

"…Rielle."

"Hmmmm?" Rielle said. Part of her didn't want to talk, just yet. She wanted to lay there and bask in the intoxication she'd found in her mage's arms, under his gentle touch, and in her complete certainty that everything he said and did was true and shared with her.

"I do hate to bring this up NOW…but it's been going through my head all day. I need to do it before I lose my nerve."

Then again, he was still a man, and a mage, and hence doubly stupid. Rielle sighed inwardly. Well, at least he hadn't rolled over and gone to sleep.

"What?" Rielle said, opening her eyes. "What, do you have a disease?"

"No, no. Nothing like that. But…you might not like it." Zackel said. "All I ask is that you let me finish before you respond."

Rielle looked at the mage with an open, curious gaze, before she nodded her assent. Zackel took a deep breath.

"…We can't stay together."

"WHAT?" Rielle said, starting to sit up.

"Wait wait wait! You said you'd let me finish!" Zackel said.

"Then you should have picked a better way to open!" Rielle said, before flicking Zackel on the forehead.

"I couldn't think of one…" Zackel said lamely. It earned him another flick to the temple. "Let me clarify. It has nothing to do with any societal pressures: my race and yours know where they can get off if they decide to tell me or you that we're wrong for each other. And it has nothing to do with 'I thought you understood what this was' or any of that 'sex is conquest' bullshit, because I hate that shit, and I'd have to be a complete and utter MORON to pull it with you, for many, MANY reasons. And, well, it has nothing to do with lack of sexual satisfaction, because…well, yikes…"

"Please continue digging. The dirt arcs get more fascinating each time." Rielle said in a deadpan tone, now leaning her head on one arm.

"…Rielle. A lot's happened to us and between us here. But it hasn't changed why we came here. _I _did so willingly, but you were tricked into coming here. From Northrend."

"So?"

"…In that regard, we're still of two different worlds." Zackel said. "Even if I completely alter my philosophy about power, and believe me it's going to get a considerable tune-up, and even if I work out the most optimum route…it's going to take me time to reach your level. And not an inconsequential amount of time either."

"…Then I'll stay with you." Rielle said, putting her hand down and shifting her weight to lean on her elbow. "Zackel, all joking aside, don't ever, _EVER_ think that you don't deserve me. After all we've gone through, how I feel about you…I'd consider it a personal insult."

"…Thank you for making that offer, Rielle. I knew you would." Zackel said. "I wish I could say I was short-sighted enough to take you up on it. But I'm not. That's the problem of being a games-person. You start thinking moves ahead out of habit."

"You think I'd be a hindrance?"

"Not in that way, no." Zackel said. "But Rielle…you went to Northrend for a reason. The fact that you would give that up means the world for me. But I am not your whole world. And if you had to tag along with me while I seek my own path to power…I fear that that fact would overshadow everything else in our relationship. I fear you'd feel trapped, like your skills were atrophying…much like how you felt in this fortress. Yes, what we share now…I'd like to think it compensated…"

"It did." Rielle said, and the truth in her tone made Zackel feel even more like a tool for making this topic their first pillow-talk.

"…But I know that the compensation wouldn't last. Worse, I'd know how you would feel. It would affect my training, turn it to try and make you happy instead of doing what I thought was best. I can't, and I won't, do that to you, nor to us." Zackel said.

"…And the same holds true if I brought you with me."

"Northrend is for the finest, Rielle. I'm not that yet." Zackel said. "If I went there, it would be a dice roll, and the numbers would be against me. I'd potentially be so out of my depth that I wouldn't so much be learning as I would be surviving. And just like before, you'd be torn away from your desires and would be forced into the role of babysitter. The end result would be the same. A budding flower laid low by weeds. When the storm ends, and we can finally leave these mountains…we have to go our separate ways."

Rielle was silent, the dim light in her eyes making her face hard to read. It was amazing how a Draenei's features could flip back and forth between blank and blatant.

"…You're right." Rielle finally said. "I guess we'll have to stay in touch until your procrastinating ass finally catches back up to me. Mail service in Northrend is iffy, but…"

"Actually…I'm not wholly done." Zackel said. "I…don't think we should do that either."

"…why?" Rielle said, her tone strangely calm. Zackel closed his eyes and sighed; this was the area of his logic where he had no idea if he was right or wrong. And just like with Jasciona, it might cost him everything.

"A lot of relationships…they don't work out because people speed along in sharing obligations. They get caught up in its fervor, in all its possibilities…and they try and do too much at once. And what they try to do and make collapses under its own weight. I don't want that for us. I don't know exactly how many people you've been with, and how serious any of those relationships were, but I had one relationship that suffered from that, and that was enough." Zackel said. "Trading letters, visiting each other through magical means, even setting a meeting date at a certain place…maybe it won't cause any harm. Or maybe it will distract us away from the primary tasks we've set before ourselves. Give us a feeling of an obligation that shouldn't yet be there. Let its presence affect us, maybe good, maybe ill, but having an affect regardless. For someone like you and me…it might throw chains on what we have before it could even get off the ground. Basically…if you love something, set it free."

"…And what? You think that because of how we feel, and how we're so selfless…the Light will guide us back together? Some nonsense like that?" Rielle said.

"…Perhaps. It brought us together now, didn't it?"

"These circumstances are not prone for repeats."

"…yeah. More than you realize." Zackel said. "That's the final part of this, Rielle. We were thrown together, forced into a crisis situation, subjected to all sorts of crap due to the machinations of an outside influence…and we found each other. By itself, it's more precious to me than any amount of power or money…but in the big picture, it's not exactly the healthiest way for a relationship to come about. Add in all the pitfalls I just listed…well, love is always tricky. But too many people try and take it on its face. You and I know that life's not like that. That life is a test…and the sooner you begin putting something to the test, however you do so…the sooner you can realize if what you have is something that will endure. All I want…is for what we have to endure. And all my thinking…brought me back to this."

"…So all we have is this, and then we part. And leave it to chance if we ever meet again, or if we're the same person when we do." Rielle said quietly.

"…Yes. I can try and spin it as much as I want, but yes. That's what I think is best." Zackel said. "I think that with what I feel…what we have…no matter what, we'll find each other again. When things are better. When we can be all we can be together, instead of either of us being a hindrance to the other. For you, Rielle…I would gladly sacrifice months for a lifetime, rather then the other way around."

Rielle was silent again.

"…But I'm just one part of this. You're the other." Zackel said, closing his eyes. "If you have a better argument, if you see flaws in mine I don't, if you can prove I'm as big an idiot and a piece of shit as I feel…then I'll listen. And we'll decide on what's best."

"…you were not the only one who had these thoughts, mage. I've turned them over in my head too." Rielle said. "…Okay."

"…what?"

"I would love to argue, berate, smack you around…but as much as it pains me to say it, you're probably right. So we'll do what you suggest." Rielle said, raising her eyes to look into Zackel's once more. "On one condition."

"Yes?"

"Whatever you do…if you do ANYTHING that would have disappointed me…then don't bother looking me up." Rielle said. "Because if…WHEN, we meet up once more…I'll know. And that would be worse if I never saw you again. At least with that…I can comfort myself with the possibility you just died. A cold comfort…but one I could accept, in time. Anything else…don't you dare do anything that would disappoint me."

"…Done." Zackel said. Rielle let out a slow breath.

"You just talked me into the second-stupidest thing I ever heard. I really have fallen for you." Rielle said, flicking Zackel in the forehead.

"Well, I suppose I had to wear you down eventually." Zackel replied, his tense muscles finally relaxing. "Wait, second-stupidest? What was the first?"

"It's tied with everything else you ever said." Rielle said, the faint sadness of their choice fading away in her eyes, replaced again with the same vital passion Zackel was glad he'd help bring back to the Draenei. Even if their relationship didn't work in the long run, he felt content at that fact. Magicians tended to be destroyers, the breakers of armies and countries. It was nice to occasionally create something.

"Walked into that one."

"It's our last night together. Need to get them where I can."

"Well yes. Now that the BIG issue is out of the way, there are several secondary issues about our relationship I'd like to address." Zackel said. "Number One. While I am quite willing to…"

Zackel's words cut off as Rielle gave him a light but firm shove, forcing him onto his back, Rielle keeping her down with her hand as she slipped on top of him.

"Rie-"

Rielle stopped the mage's words against by placing her finger against his lips. Zackel went quiet, looking up into the Draenei's beautiful face, her bangs of hair undone from her horns and dangling slightly above it, and of course, her wondrous eyes.

"You talk too much." Rielle whispered, and kissed Zackel again. The feel of her lips and her body against him made Zackel realize that yes, there were better ways they could spend the next few immediate hours. Reaching up, her drew her fully against him, feeling her heartbeat against his chest even as he traced his fingers lightly over her horns and down against her cranial tendrils, feeling the Draenei stiffen as he did so.

"Mmmmmm…oh Kel."

"…Call me Zack."

And for a long period of bliss, the two Alliance members knew only the warmth of each other.

* * *

"_Now that your rose is in bloom…_

_A light hits the gloom_

_On the gray…"_


	32. Such Sweet Sorrow

Chapter 32: Such Sweet Sorrow

Zackel wasn't much surprised that the ogres were gone.

He also wasn't much surprised that the only thing they had left behind was Mug'thol's head.

"I'll admit I'm hardly an expert…" Zackel said, crouching down by the severed, semi-destroyed cranium. The mage would have sworn the ogres hadn't even moved it from where it had come to rest after Zackel had tossed it: as said, it was the only thing that remained in the basement room besides the scattered bones and waste. The ogres had all cleared out down the tunnel, and Zackel saw no need to follow them. In his own way, he wished them well, or at least no further harm unless it was called for. "But I'd say that even in your species' viewpoints on strength equally superiority…that while you might have been a great dictator, you were a piss-poor leader."

Mug'thol, quite obviously, had no reply. Zackel stood back up, stretching his legs beneath his robe.

"Now, this might come off as petty, but all the same…" Zackel said, and then kicked Mug'thol's head off into the dark tunnel. "That's for hurting Rielle, you son of a bastard."

Turning, Zackel tossed a gesture over his shoulder, fire exploding in the tunnel and sealing it off from the castle once more.

"And that is probably more of a burial than you deserve." Zackel said, walking up the stairs of the basement for the last time, his feet splashing in the pool of water from his melted ice plug.

The castle was quiet as he entered the hallway, and Zackel paused, looking up at the stairs leading to the main room. Despite the fact that he knew Rielle was waiting for him by the castle entrance, he found himself climbing back up the stairs before he reached the doorway of the room they'd spent all their time in.

Stripped of the small touches Rielle and Zackel had added to it, the abandoned nature of the Alterac fortress came back full force. The pair had left the cleaned ogre blankets in the room, though Zackel felt a tinge of sadness looking at them now. He traced his eyes over the washtub and buckets, the broken and battered furniture, the bashed-up fireplace whose fire had finally been completely extinguished, feeling strange that they would provoke such sentimentality in him. Then again, he'd found a wonderful thing here, so maybe it made more sense than one would think.

"….So long." Zackel said, tossing a salute to the room before heading back down the stairs, the mage heading to the front of the castle. He'd thought that he might find Rielle in the room with the gate controls, but the Draenei was absent: apparently, she'd already activated them and moved on from there. Zackel headed to the door, feeling the slight breeze on his face as he did.

Rielle was standing on the small stone bridge that entered into the castle, staring up at the semi-clear blue sky. The Draenei was fully back in her armor now (said armor having been checked for any more nasty surprises), save for the face mask/plate of her helmet. She turned her head as Zackel approached, though the way she kept her axe on the ground indicated that she knew it was him.

"Ogres have cleared out. Might have been gone for hours." Zackel said.

"Hmmm. No longer our problem." Rielle said. "So, this is it, right? This isn't some eye of a hurricane or something, because I swear, if I have to spend another several weeks trapped with you, I don't care WHAT you are to me now, you WILL end up a head on that mantelpiece I broke."

"Personally, I'd think I'd make a poor trophy specimen." Zackel said. "It's over, Rielle. I knew it when I woke up this morning. The storm has passed. Any other storm that comes by is not my doing, and from tasting the air, I can assure that the odds of another storm happening in the immediate future are nil."

"I would have laid same odds on some other things about you, mage." Rielle said, turning and coming close to Zackel. "But…I guess with that fact done, this is goodbye."

"…Guess so." Zackel said.

"…Well, maybe. I'm going to feel very foolish about the supposed poignancy we could have here if I see you in Southshore in a few hours." Rielle said.

"You probably won't…" Zackel said, glancing over Rielle's shoulder. "I think…I'm going to just stay in the area a little longer. Have a moment alone, with my thoughts and experiences."

"You still think there's treasure lying around you don't want to share with me, don't you."

"Now Rielle, who knows what the ogres have lying around that they…I MEAN…!" Zackel said with exaggerated alarm. "I mean just that, in seriousness."

"I figured you did." Rielle said, before bopping Zackel on the top of his head.

"OW! That actually kind of hurt! What was that for?" Zackel said, holding his head.

"That was for taking credit for killing Mug'thol. Fraud."

"You know I did that for simplicity's sake-OW!" Zackel yelled as Rielle bopped him again.

"That one was for the road." Rielle said, and did it again.

"OW!"

"One to grow on."

"OW!" Zackel said as the Draenei bopped him a fourth time.

"And one for luck." Rielle said, before she leaned in. "And this…is for everything else."

The slight chill on Rielle's lips only made her greater warmth evident. Zackel let his staff go to fully draw the Draenei to him, embracing her as close as he could. The sweetness of the kiss almost compensated for the sorrow when Rielle broke it.

"May the Light embrace you." Rielle whispered.

"I think it already has." Zackel said. Rielle smiled softly before stepping away from Zackel, producing her face-plate from her side and snapping it on.

"…See you." Rielle said, turning around and beginning her walk away.

"…Later." Zackel replied, watching the Draenei go. The snow crunched softly beneath her boots as she walked off, leaving a trail behind her. Zackel allowed himself one last look at her, both appreciative and amorous…

Before Rielle's foot hit a hidden pocket in the ground and plunged in, the Draenei almost falling flat on her face.

"ARGH!" Rielle yelled, her voice echoing across the Alterac Mountains. "…You didn't see that. Tell me you didn't see that."

"Okay. I won't tell you." Zackel said.

"_Weerkuay."_ Rielle said, pulling herself back up and shaking the snow off her leg. "I'm really starting to miss my Elekk…"

Zackel said nothing, sitting on the side of the stone bridge and watching Rielle as she truly headed off. He closed his eyes before she vanished from sight, keeping them closed for a long time after he knew she was gone. All the same, Zackel felt the same mournful tinge when he opened his eyes and looked at her tracks, a lone line against the otherwise-unbroken snow.

"…show me…the way to go home…I'm tired and I want to go to bed…" Zackel hummed to himself, leaning on his staff. "I met one fel of a girl today, and she's gone right to my head…wherever I may roam…by land or sea or foam…"

* * *

Zackel didn't know how long he sat there, but what ultimately drew his attention were the yells being carried on the wind. Opening one eye, he tried to focus in on the sounds and, when he found that didn't really work, he stood up and put a hand behind his ear.

The noises were faint but constant, and of one singular breed: combat. Zackel cocked his head at the impression of the din, trying to puzzle out just what it meant. Had Rielle run into trouble? Had some Crushridge ogre remnants found her and tried to seek revenge? No, that couldn't be it, he'd been sitting at the front of the castle for at least an hour, surely Rielle was long gone, or at least long out of range of his hearing. Then what was that…?

"…Well…it's not like I can shoot myself in the foot any harder." Zackel said, and began heading in the direction of the noise. He kept his eyes and ears open as he went, ready for any possible ambush, but none came as he made his way through the Alterac ruins, eventually reaching the mountain gates he'd passed through an eternity ago. The sound was close there, and Zackel continued to follow it.

The moment the mountains were no longer blocking his view, he could see the smoke. After traversing some more snow and a steep hill, Zackel found its source.

Down in the snowy valley before him, dozens of men and women were stationed. Zackel's eyes widened a bit as he crouched, having immediately had a bad feeling. Said feeling proved to be accurate once Zackel made out the sole characteristic all the men and women shared: they all wore yellow bandannas over their lower faces. Syndicate.

"The fel…?" Zackel said, peering around the battlefield that the Syndicate had forged. Several bodies of members of the organization lay in the snow, blood staining the white red…as did the bodies of a few ogres. It didn't take Zackel long to figure out just WHAT the Syndicate was targeting, once he spotted the ogre corpses. The group had all clustered around a large cave entrance: even as Zackel watched, two Syndicate humans tossed small objects into the cave. A blast of smoke and a muffled boom indicated said objects were clearly bombs.

"Keep it up!" One of the Syndicate yelled. "They can't hide in there…!"

A thrown stone hammer took the yelling Syndicate's head right off, but the ogre that had come out to throw it paid a dear price as several crossbow bolts slammed into his body. The ogre tried to turn and flee back into the cave, but a few more crossbow bolts to the back dropped him for good.

"That's it boys! Smoke 'em out, and then cut them down!" Another Syndicate member yelled, though this one had the sense to keep his head down when he did so. Another Syndicate member tossed another bomb, even as several others fired more crossbow bolts around and into the cave entrance. Zackel swore he heard a faint cry inside the cave, though whether it was from fear or pain, Zackel didn't know.

But he did know that the cave the Syndicate were laying siege too was far too small to be effectively defended. The Crushridge ogres that had survived the storm had clearly done so only to fall prey to an attack of opportunity by the Syndicate.

The Syndicate, who likely hadn't been hiding inside from a killer blizzard for weeks, living off whatever food they had. For who knows how long, both groups had fought over the Alterac Ruins, and now it seemed like the Syndicate had picked the perfect time to end it. And it would only end one way.

Zackel hadn't seen any bodies of ogre women and children, but he doubted they were hiding somewhere else. He also doubted that the Syndicate would discriminate.

But really, why was this his problem? He'd gone above and beyond already for the ogres. This wasn't his fight…

It was just the fight the ogres found themselves in because of him.

"_Don't you dare do anything that would disappoint me…"_

"…where is the line between a champion and a fool…?" Zackel said, brushing back his hair. "…A champion probably has more money."

The chill energies began to build around Zackel, the mage calling upon his gift from the Light and the crafters of existence. Maybe he couldn't start a blizzard again (or rather, he COULD, but that would have been the absolute stupidest option he could have picked, because even if he escaped this time, the ogres would still have to deal with it), but he hadn't spent all that time on the roof without learning a few tricks that would let him damn well fake one for a bit. And the Syndicate, as dressed as they were for the weather, were not dressed well enough.

"…Guess I'm a fool then." Zackel said. "Too bad for me. And for them."

The winds began to surge down from the mountain, Zackel's hair and robes fluttering in its embrace as he stood up. Whether it was the overt movement or the actual gale, the Syndicate finally noticed he was there.

"Who the fel is…!"

"Just a fool." Zackel said, and raised his staff.

The ice storm erupted from his body, sweeping down from the hill and engulfing the Syndicate thugs. Zackel watched the criminals recoil, yell, stumble around, and generally try to defend themselves with calm detachment.

"But I'm in good company." Zackel said. "The black wind blows; the fickle grace of possibilities. Now it comes on the winter of your discontent."

As far as his poetry went, Zackel thought it was pretty poor. Then again, one shouldn't waste the good material on rabble. Besides, Rielle wasn't here to critique him.

He wondered what she would have thought of this.

It was a question that ultimately was far colder than any of the storm he'd called to scatter the Syndicate. For when all was said and done, he never saw her again.


	33. Epilogue: Fate's Wide Wheel

Epilogue: Fate's Wide Wheel

"…And that…is pretty much it, Ninos." Zackel Wintersoul said, as he put his empty mug down. The Legerdemain Lounge had grown considerably quieter over the long period of time Zackel had been telling his story to the young priest that he'd shared a table with (which was a lot, all things considered, and with the fact that Brewfest was due to begin soon, the mage could only wonder how loud and chaotic the Lounge and its fellow organizations would be then). Zackel had originally taken the seat he was in based on the fact that the priest, one Ninos Silverstream, looked fairly non-threatening, and the last thing Zackel had wanted in the cross-faction bar was a fight. As it had turned out, the awkward-looking (in a relatively good way, but still notable) young man had done his own read of Zackel, deciding that he looked like someone he could trust enough to ask a question of soon after they'd made introductions.

Said question had ended up being one of a very personal nature. After deciding not to walk away (the mage having gleaned himself that if Ninos was asking HIM this, he probably didn't have _ANYONE_ he could confide in, a feeling Zackel had his own experiences with), Zackel had managed to get some details out of the priest over the nature of his question with a little skilled prying (and then told Ninos to be more careful about who he shared such information with). Despite its rather off-putting nature, the priest's story had struck a chord. Ordering a fresh drink, Zackel had begun to tell his own.

Several hours later, night had fallen, and the story was done.

"…Uh…so, what happened to the ogres?" Ninos said.

"Oh THAT…well, my storm confused and rattled the Syndicate enough that they decided to bug out, so I saved them…but by doing so, I ended up making myself their leader. AGAIN." Zackel said. "It took me another three days to talk my way out of it. What I did in the end was claim that as the Crushridge leader, it was my duty to explore the wider world and bring back wealth and glory to the Clan, and that a substitute leader would have to serve in my place until I returned. Once I sold them on that, several of the ogre men fought to see who was the strongest, and I declared the winner the leader in my stead and finally got out of those thrice-damned mountains."

"So you abandoned them then?" Ninos said. The mage gave his fellow Alliance member a wry look, causing the priest to stutter an apology. The mage closed his eyes as he rolled them: the read Zackel had gotten on the boy (as he didn't exactly strike Zackel as a man yet, despite being of age) was that he was nice, and seemed to have a decent amount of power and skill, but his social skills were lacking and he tended to occasionally blurt things out that were even stupider and/or inappropriate than what Zackel himself could say at times. No wonder he'd ended up in the fix he'd asked Zackel for advice/help for (or, for that matter, that he'd asked Zackel, then a complete stranger, for said help. There were more than a few Alliance members and even more Horde members that would have strung the priest up before tarring and feathering him for what he'd done, so considering he'd blurted it out to someone like Zackel…The Light DID work in mysterious ways).

"Could have…didn't. Like I said, a fool." Zackel said. "I went back a few months later, mainly due to the fact that I picked up this big axe I couldn't use and I thought it was too well-crafted to go to waste. I basically spun some bullshit that I wanted to explore the world more and that a true leader of the Crushridge would be the one who wished to stay and look after his fellows, and I handed the axe over to the leader, Fuduir I believe his name was, said he was now the true leader, and then I left again. From there I had more adventures and troubles, though technically I also had those in my trip when I finally left…but those are not really relevant. Eventually, as promised, I made my way to Northrend. And here I am now, in my new robe, talking with you."

Zackel leaned back in his chair, weariness beginning to settle on him. Between that, and the fact that as nice as his newly acquired clothing looked, with its blue, purple, and grey colors and semi-plate like design, not to mention the whole seething with incredible magical power aspect, it was still new and had caused him more than a few constant itches. Ninos wore something similar, though his robes had brown in their different color scheme instead of gray. Considering what Zackel had gone through on his trip across Northrend to get his robes, the mage could only wonder how Ninos had gotten his. Though based on some of Ninos' comments, it could very well have just been by going out with combat types and hiding behind them while keeping them alive.

"And did you find Rielle?" Ninos asked.

For once, Zackel was rather glad about Ninos' naivety. It kept him from noticing the subtle reaction Zackel had when Ninos asked him the question. There had been one crucial difference between the story Zackel had told Ninos and what he had experienced. While he had been vague on some of the more intimate details, the only part he had deliberately left out was the last one.

And so, he lied.

"It has…proven difficult." Zackel said, rolling his shoulders. "But whether I do or not…it's not pertinent to the question you asked me. You told me about Kaileni, and all that stuff that happened in Stranglethorn…and you wanted to know something about it all. Whether it could possibly mean anything, or work in any way. So I told you about what I went through. With myself and Rielle. What you do with that information is up to you."

The young priest had no reply, instead nervously fidgeting with his hands.

"…Ninos, look." Zackel said, leaning back in and putting his own hand on top of the priest's. "You opened up to me…probably WAYYYY too much considering we just MET…but that's another story and another lesson, for another day. But it's all pointless if you're lying to yourself. I had to learn that lesson the hard way, and I wouldn't wish that experience on anyone…no matter what the lie covers. It just isn't worth it in the end. So…Ninos, it WAS consensual, wasn't it? Because if it WASN'T, if you're trying to spin it, then a random stranger in a bar is NOT who you should be speaking to."

"…Yeah." Ninos said. "I might not have exactly jumped in feet first…but once my shock wore off a bit, I…I participated. It wasn't rape."

"…All right." Zackel said. "Well if that's the case…well, I'm not one to make assumptions about your life and whatever you experienced, Ninos. Nor am I the one to tell you exactly what you're feeling means, especially considering the likely…difficulties of such a relationship. Especially if she just saw it as a fun experience to share and doesn't have the deeper resonance you're having. Rielle and I, we may have had our differences we had to overcome…but she wasn't a tr-"

"Please don't say that out loud." Ninos said.

"As you wish." Zackel said. "Though one thing you need to ask yourself, Ninos. Are you more bothered by what people would think of her race, or by the fact that if you ask the average Alliance male, they'll say that females like that all have faces that could stop clocks?"

"THEY DON'T, SHE WASN'T…!"

"Ep ep ep. I know Ninos. I gathered that from your description. I suspect you'd be better off if she had been. Yeah, it's shallow, but everyone needs to grow out of that their own way. Besides, maybe by her standards, she IS ugly…but she's not here, so I won't debate her motives or how she might feel. And I really shouldn't debate yours."

"…Yeah." Ninos said.

"You wanted help, I offered help as I saw fit. I told you my story. Considering my experience and yours, maybe we were meant to cross paths. But I have to get back on my own. As will you."

"…I really don't know if I like the looks of mine." Ninos said.

"Then change it. And accept there are some things you might not be able to change. Once you figure that out, the rest falls into place sooner or later." Zackel said, standing up and tossing several gold pieces on the table. "Good luck. And if whatever happens with you and Kaileni ends in regret, well…that's the gamble. You may regret it more if you don't try."

"…Yeah." Ninos said again. Zackel sighed inwardly. The kid really was pretty decent, but he had problems Zackel couldn't help him with beyond what he'd already done.

"One more thing…I know you probably don't like keeping this inside you. But, and the fact that I am repeatedly stressing this should give you more than enough of a clue…you lucked out with me, Ninos. Be very careful who you decide to talk to this about."

"Yeah yeah." Ninos said, waving Zackel off half-heartedly.

"Well…perhaps see you around then." Zackel said, heading for the door.

"Yeah." Ninos said. Zackel accepted the monotone of the repetitive responses: the priest was likely turning inward to try and find answers. Zackel paused in the doorway, glancing briefly over his shoulder.

When he looked away, he finally let the mask fall away from his features. He hadn't liked his deception, but considering how twisted up Ninos was over his own experiences, Zackel had figured that it would be better to present his story with its slight omission then tell him the whole truth. In his heart, he hoped that Ninos' past and future ended up working for him, one way or another.

When all was said and done, at least he wasn't a fool.

* * *

The _Hero's Welcome _inn had similarly cleared out as Zackel stepped into it, most of the guests having retired to their rooms. Zackel vaguely returned the wave of the assistant innkeeper as he headed upstairs to his room.

"_Rielle? The Draenei, right?" The bare-chested man said. Zackel had been completely floored when he'd met the man, Commander Zanneth, and found actually DID walk around outside in the Northrend winter without a shirt. A small part of Zackel's mind had wondered how much food the Alliance leader went through every day to keep the metabolic fires burning in him to that degree._

"_Yes, that's her." Zackel said, leaning against a table in the man's tent._

"_Yes, I remember her. Mainly because I thought she went AWOL." Zanneth said, peering over a notice._

"_She told you what happened?"_

"_Maybe. I don't remember. When she turned back up, the Horde had taken this structure and I was in the middle of organizing a counter-attack. A successful one, as you can see." Zanneth said. "I didn't really care about her supposed 'banishment' due to some issues she had with some mage, I needed strong arms. She provided them, helped take the mines back."_

"_And then she left." Zackel said with some resignation._

"_No, actually. She hung around for some time after that. Apparently the mage she had a disagreement with had cleared out weeks before she got back, and she decided sticking around instead of futilely chasing him was a better use of her time. I appreciated it. I lost a fair number of good soldiers when they went to go investigate that Ulduar location. Though considering I hear they helped beat back an Old God, it's probably a good thing they went…"_

"_She went to Ulduar?"_

"_No, that incident was pretty much finished when she returned." Zanneth said, signing something on his paper before looking at Zackel. "However, something new has come up. The Argent Dawn is, well, WAS holding a tournament to find elite soldiers. She left to try and gain entry to that, about two weeks ago."_

"_A tournament? Where?"_

"_Far north of the Icecrown region." Zanneth said. "You sure you aren't interested in staying here? She might return, and I never turn down help."_

"_Sorry Commander." Zackel said, getting up off the table. "But I was never one for fighting with people we should be trying to make peace with."_

"_If that's how you feel." Zanneth said, and returned to his work, speaking no more as Zackel left his tent._

Despite how many adventurers and warriors that were traveling through Dalaran, the inn was fairly quiet as Zackel pulled out his key and opened the door. Moonlight streamed into the room through the window, but all that did was illuminate the emptiness of it. Zackel considered the bed a moment before turning towards the basic desk instead, sitting down and leaning his staff against the wall.

A moment later, it slipped and clattered against the floor. Zackel sighed as he leaned over to pick it up: at times like this, he missed his old red-gemmed staff. Maybe this new one, with its circular top adorned with feathers, was technically far stronger, but it was also top-heavy, something Zackel hadn't yet gotten used to. Then again, maybe that was what you got when you picked up the leftovers of the fallen…

"_Can't you see I'm busy?" The gnome said, bent over a massive desk covered with papers and other bureaucratic paraphernalia._

"_Sorry, sorry." Zackel said. "I was just trying to find your combatant records and I was directed here…"_

"_You mean the Trial of the Crusader records? HA!" The gnome said. "That was a disaster from the start! First that idiot Fizzlebang somehow summons an eredar lord, then that ravening nut bag Hellscream turned our peaceful coalition into another pissing contest, and just when you think it couldn't get any worse, the thrice-damned Lich King turns up and opens up a sinkhole beneath the coliseum! The whole place nearly fell right into the ground! Worse, he had one of his most powerful servants down there! Every single organized attempt we had in place to get data went right out the window! I think half the people who got pulled out of that hole alive hadn't even properly entered, they just jumped in to help!" The gnome said. "I'm sorry, this isn't your fault, but I feel like I'm wasting my time on a pointless endeavor here."_

"…_can I try and look through some of your records then?"_

"_Sure, if you want." The gnome said, producing a pipe and lighting it. "However, since you seem to be looking for someone, I can give you __**one **__bit of advice…"_

With the staff more carefully placed, Zackel interlaced his fingers and stared at the wall in front of him. Remembering just what he had left out telling Ninos. Remembering…

_He hadn't expected to find it until he did. He'd gone up to the graveyard as a means of elimination, refusing to believe it could be anything else. The refusal had lasted until he saw the name on the stone._

_He didn't really remember falling to his knees. All he remembered was reaching out and touching the rough stone, so cold beneath his hand. Tracing the name there, not wanting to believe it._

_Many had come to the Trial, to prove themselves worthy of fighting the Lich King. Of showing their strength. And in turn, many had not come back alive._

_The world played no favorites, and gave no exceptions, in the matters of such things. All there was, was what there was. And that was that._

"…_I'm sorry…" Zackel whispered, feeling the tears start to fall. Feeling Rielle's name beneath his hand, just one stone among many. Feeling all the possibilities fall apart, all that could have been, all that he'd thrown away. He'd gambled and lost, and this time, the responsibility lay solely with him._

"…_I'm so sorry…" Zackel said, lowering his head. His tears fell to the snow beneath him, more heat to be swallowed by the coldness of the land._

_In that moment, in that chill, Zackel thought he would never be warm again._

Except, Zackel now realized, that was not the way it should have been. He'd alternated the last week or so in his life between throwing himself into tasks given by the Argent Dawn to earn some of their rewards, to cloak himself in stronger threads and armaments so that he could survive, and raging and despairing over what the point of continuing was. Eventually, he'd grown weary in all aspects, and returned to Dalaran. He'd gone into the bar, planning to drink until he didn't feel the pain any more.

Then Ninos had come along, and Zackel had been briefly drawn out of his state by the unexpected strangeness the priest had brought him. Despite himself, despite his pain, Ninos' story had made Zackel recall his own.

In recalling it, over these past few hours, Zackel had realized the vital truths in it. He couldn't go down this path again, no matter what had caused it. If he did, he would stand to lose even more than he had. And that would be more than terrible. It would not be…

A knock came at his door. Zackel looked up from his mournful introspection, before standing up to open it.

Before he touched the knob, a sudden, impossible hope ran through him.

Until he opened it and saw the gnome standing there. The ethereal glint faded away, swallowed back into the reality of life. Zackel swallowed down the lump in his throat and looked at the gnome, who he didn't recognize.

"Yes?"

"Sayyyyy…" The gnome said, clearly intoxicated. "I saw you walkkin by, and I hadda know…do you purposely color-coordinate your armor and your weapon, and what does…"

Zackel firmly closed the door in the gnome's face. For a few seconds, he leaned against it, before a bubble of laughter spilled out from his mouth at the random absurdity of it all. At least the gnome hadn't asked him how he'd gotten his hair and his cloak to merge.

"Maybe I should switch up my follicle color…" Zackel said, making his way back over to the table, ignoring the gnome's sputtering yells outside as he sat back down, the gnome eventually going quiet.

For some time, he stared at his hands, at the faint scars on his knuckles and what they represented. He wondered that, in time, if he'd realize some even crueler possibilities of what had happened to him and Rielle, and why they'd separated, never to meet again. Maybe he'd subconsciously been afraid to fall in love again and had pushed her away. Maybe she herself had been scared of the intimacy and had readily accepted his logic of why they had had to part. Or maybe there would be no such answers, the only reason given being the cruel spokes on the wheel of fate.

But, as he'd sat there and spoken, he'd done what he should have done before, when he'd found the grave. He'd remembered.

All the things that had brought him to that castle, and all the things that he'd taken away from it…

At what he'd wanted, and what Rielle had wanted. How they'd know what that meant.

How they, for all they had gone through, had managed to mean something to each other. How each, burdened with their own regrets, would likely not want the other to return to that weighted, muted life. There was so much more in the world than that.

Even if some of the comforts ended up being so cold.

"_Don't you dare do anything to disappoint me, mage."_

Zackel remembered the words. He remembered the times, the games, the discussions. The feel of her body in his hands, of her lips against his. Of her self-assured smile and confident eyes. At the dear heart that lay behind them.

He had to. For her.

"…I won't." Zackel said, holding up his hands. "I won't disappoint you…or myself. I won't…do something so stupid. I promise…I promise."

The chill energies surged up, ice blooming into being above Zackel's hands. The flower took shape before him, its bud opening up into a perfect gem of ice.

"…I miss you." Zackel said, looking at the flower. "But I'll do more than just that. I will…"

Slowly, the flower began to spin. Zackel watched it, wondering what tomorrow would bring.

"…da dah…dah dah dah…dah dah dah dah, dah dah…"

Some ideas seemed so great for their time. Some stories seemed so marvelous. But nothing ever ended the way you thought it would. And all great love stories, after all, were tragedies.

Sometimes…that was just the way the wind blew.

"…goodbye."

* * *

"_Some say love it is a river  
That drowns the tender reed  
Some say love it is a razor  
That leaves your soul to bleed_

_When the night has been too lonely  
And the road has been too long  
And you think that love is only  
For the lucky and the strong_

_Just remember in the winter  
Far beneath the bitter snows  
Lies the seed  
That with the sun's love  
In the spring  
Becomes the rose."_

_**THE END...?**_


	34. True Epilogue: Carnival of Rust

True Epilogue: Carnival of Rust

"_It's all a game  
Avoiding failure  
When true colors will bleed  
All in the name...of misbehavior  
And the things we don't need.  
I lust for after, No disaster, Can touch  
Touch us anymore  
And more than ever, I hope to never fall  
Where enough was not the same it was before."_

Zackel only became aware of the knocking after whoever had started it had been hammering at his door for nearly twenty seconds. How long he'd been sitting there and pondering his thoughts, he couldn't say, but deep aggravation settled on him regardless. The gnome must have taken offense and come back with a friend or something. Clenching his teeth, the stood up from the desk and stalked over to the door, calling his staff to his hand as he did so. He took a moment to transfer it to his good hand and get it ready, and then yanked the door open.

"I _TOLD _you that…!"

The words died in Zackel's throat. It wasn't the gnome again.

"Please…" The figure said. The armor had changed, having gone from black to a elaborate mix of blue, silver, and gold, the black helmet and attached face-plate having changed to a crown-like one with a shimmering white energy obscuring the facial slot, and the orange axe had been replaced by one that was somehow even bigger, this one colored silver and blue like the armor. But the body structure was Draenei, and the voice…

"Like I ever listened to anything you tried to tell me." Rielle said.

"…..Rielle?" Zackel whispered.

"No, a murloc in an elaborate suit who learned to speak Common. Yes, it's me, Zackel." Rielle said. "I thought I'd…"

Rielle's voice stopped as Zackel reached out, feeling at the warrior's helmet.

"…Please tell me I'm not dreaming." Zackel said. "Please tell me…"

Rielle let her hand do the talking as she violently poked Zackel in the forehead. Zackel stumbled back from the touch.

"You know, if I'd known you were going to act so wonky when you saw me, well, just makes me glad I decided to follow you up to your quarters here instead of chasing you down on the street." Rielle said, walking into the room. "I mean, it's good to…ugh, I'm bad at saying hello after long absences, okay? I just…Zackel?"

A thousand different things crashed through the mage's head as he realized that he wasn't dreaming. He was awake, and Rielle was here.

He wanted to break down crying. He wanted to scream at her for making him think he'd lost her, whether it was her fault or not. He wanted to grab hold of her and never let go. He wanted to teleport back to the Argent grounds and strangle the gnome who had clearly given him wrong information and then find whoever had falsely put Rielle's name on the list of the fallen and do worse to them. He wanted to do it all at once, and hence in the end all he could really do was stagger back and fall down on the bed, his muscles nearly tearing themselves apart from the sensations running through it.

"Zackel? What's wrong?" Rielle said, approaching.

"Need a minute! Just…minute…!" Zackel said, forcing himself to look away from Rielle. When he looked back, she was still there. Still real. Zackel violently pinched himself and then recalled several memories of his past before he looked at her again. Still there. Still real.

Zackel closed his eyes, trying to get his feelings under control. Slowly, the sheer shock of Rielle's sudden re-appearance and the violent eruption of the several emotions that had followed began to subside. Beneath it all, the joy had begun to wake up and stretch its wings. She wasn't dead. He hadn't been a fool. He hadn't failed her…

Until he turned to look at her again, and found her looking away. Instead of watching him and his reactions, she'd walked to the nearby wall and was staring at it, in a manner that Zackel purposely recognized. She was avoiding looking at him. Down in his heart, the joy faltered.

"Rielle…?"

"Zackel I…I never liked to beat around the bush." Rielle said. "I'm glad to see you again, but…"

The word hung in the air like the most virulent curse, even as Zackel felt the coil of emotions begin to snake through his gut again. She was alive, but…the thrice-damned BUT, but WHAT…? What the fel was going ON…?

"…We knew that when we parted ways, that we were taking a risk." Rielle said. "It's not like I forgot you, or…it's just that…"

Rielle lowered her head, even as Zackel felt the air being sucked out of the room.

"…Things aren't the same." Rielle said. "I've…it's just…"

Rielle looked at Zackel, her face hidden behind her elaborate armor. She raised a hand briefly before lowering it. Zackel stared at the blank vision-shield, at the Draenei woman's stance, even as the pain fully returned, its grip seizing onto his heart.

It couldn't. Life couldn't be THAT cruel. To offer and then snatch back…

"I don't know what to say." Rielle said.

But…it was life. It played by its own rules.

Zackel closed his eyes, furiously trying to get a sense of control back. The seconds dragged out as all the possibilities slashed through his mind.

Until one voice finally pulled itself back up and spoke.

Rielle was alive. Maybe things had changed, maybe what they'd had was lost…but she was alive. That was a blessing, and while it might not salve the pain Zackel knew was to come, his damn lateral thinking couldn't dismiss it. That, and he cared too much for her to allow himself to.

Another cold comfort.

"…Rielle…" Zackel said, opening his eyes. "If you can't say anything, then I will. I made a promise not to disappoint you…and I won't. Whatever else happens…I'll keep that promise. Anything else…well…" Zackel said, and somehow managed to shrug. "I didn't go through what I did with you to end up wasting it all again."

Rielle said nothing, but Zackel could feel her eyes, the glowing lights behind her helmet. Feel them watching him, looking into him.

Her stance changed so abruptly that Zackel almost did a double-take, going from cold and distant to expressing inner agony, the Draenei reaching up and placing a hand against her helmet.

"Oh Light…" Rielle said. "Light forgive me, I'm such a _BITCH…_"

"…what?" Zackel said, the seething pain inside him abruptly overridden by confusion, the situation jerked in another direction with such swiftness Zackel almost got a physical sense of vertigo.

"How could I do this…how could I…" Rielle said, before she removed her hand from her helmet and fully turned to face Zackel. "Oh Zackel…I'm so sorry…"

"…what? WHAT?" Zackel said, completely at a loss to how the situation kept changing at such a breakneck pace.

"I didn't just see you and follow you up here. I saw you this morning, on the streets." Rielle said. "When I did…"

Rielle lowered her hand, and Zackel didn't need her skill in reading body language to recognize the regret in the move.

"I was terrified." Rielle said. "I saw you, and the feelings it brought back…I had done a lot of thinking about you, a lot of pondering, rationalizing…and then I saw you and it all got swept away by what I felt. And it scared me…scared me that I felt so helpless beneath what you brought out of me. I just…with you and I…it…"

The Draenei trailed off as she turned her back, letting go of her axe as she brought her arms up around herself.

"So I followed you. Trying to decide what to do. Part of me wanted to break it off, because of…but then you meet that kid, and you start talking, and I listen to you telling your story, our story…and it just made it WORSE. I…I've never felt this way before Zackel. I didn't think it was possible. And I didn't know what it meant for me. Then you walked off, and I followed…and when you came to the inn I found I had to sit down and think." Rielle said. "So I sat there, and I thought, and I thought…and I finally decided…if I'm going to feel this way, I have to know something. So I come up here, I surprise you, I act as I normally do, and then I spring the implication that I don't want to pick up where we left off…and I watched your face. I wanted to see the truth in your face."

Rielle went quiet, her back still to Zackel. Zackel stood where he was, not knowing what to do. Eventually, Rielle turned around.

"You would have let me go. I could see the pain the possibility caused you…but I also saw…you would have done it. You wouldn't have tried to judge me for my decision, you wouldn't have turned on me, you would have…you would have been the man I knew. You haven't changed…and I came up here, I did THAT to you, I hurt you to try and salve my own stupid, stupid fears and ego…"

Zackel held up a hand, causing Rielle to go quiet again. The mage started speaking before he forced his mouth shut again, the roiling emotions in him having become hot and jagged as Rielle had poured out her reasons for what had just happened. Between that, and the rumors of her death being greatly exaggerated, Zackel felt like he was dangling on the edge of an abyss.

But, as he stood there, the cold came. It reached out and dug its hands into the heat within him, fighting to draw it back. And as it did, it brought with it clarity.

_Yes, Zackel, what she just did was wrong. You are well within your rights to walk away. But remember why she did it. And remember that what she just did now…she might have never done to anyone before. You said you wouldn't disappoint her. Is that finally about to change?_

Zackel drew in a long, slow breath, allowing it to leave his lungs even slower.

"…yes. You did." Zackel said. "But…it's like you said. I haven't changed."

The mage stopped, considering his next words carefully.

"…you and I have always sought to be the best we could be, Rielle. It's why we parted ways…and it's why we've met again." Zackel said. "When it comes down to the true heart of it…I think we're better together. So, despite all these things, all these troubles…I want us to be together. And while I'll never presume to speak for you…you just spoke for yourself pretty clearly."

Rielle stared at Zackel for another few seconds, before she finally reached up and put her hands on her helmet. A slight hiss of air sounding as the magical protections undid themselves and allowed her to slip it off.

Her face hadn't changed, save for one small detail: the twin streaks the tears had made down her cheeks.

"…I don't deserve you." Rielle whispered.

"…Some might say that." Zackel said, finally approaching the Draenei and taking her helmet from her. Even as he put it aside, he made a slight gesture. Rielle stared at the rose of ice he had produced and offered her.

"I'm not one of them." Zackel said. "And that…should be all that's needed to be said."

Reaching up, Rielle took the rose, the perfect ice reflecting the light of her eyes.

"…oh…you sentimental spineless stupid mage _BASTARD…!"_

The embrace did not include a kiss, but Zackel didn't need it. With the Draenei in his arms, Zackel finally felt the joy pull itself free from the morass of all the other emotions and soar back up. The cold within him left, satisfied with its work and allowing itself to be replaced by warmth, both his own and Rielle's.

"…but if it's all the same…" Rielle said into Zackel's ear. "Next time I'm acting like this, you better damn well not roll over and take it."

"I promise I will never do that except when I have to." Zackel said. "Though I suppose I'm being more of a, well, what some would call a pussy, than usual mainly because I thought you were dead."

"WHAT?" Rielle said, drawing back away from Zackel. "Dead?"

"…yeah…maybe I should have mentioned that…but my mind wasn't at it's clearest state." Zackel said. "I got information you went to the Argent Tournament, followed you there, heard about the mess and the chaos, found a grave…"

"…Oh LIGHT…" Rielle said, reaching up and clutching her mouth. "I thought you were just being a flaky mage when I came in, when you…and then I pulled that BULLSHIT, how could…"

"Wait, wait. No. We already went through this. Once was enough. You are still forgiven." Zackel said, taking Rielle into his arms again. "You're alive, and you're with me. That's worth more then any petty anger I could muster, whether I deserve it or not."

"Zackel…"

"Shhhhhh…" Zackel said, holding Rielle's head to his chest. "I've been given a small miracle, and I want to savor it…just a little longer. Just a little…longer."

And so the pair stood there, before reality rudely placed itself back onto Zackel's perception. Rielle's new armor included very elaborate shoulder pads, and one was digging into his ribs.

"…Okay long enough." Zackel wheezed, pulling away.

"…Heh. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Still just a mage." Rielle said, smiling softly.

"If I didn't suddenly feel so drained, I'd be offering a counter, but…" Zackel said, as he stumbled back over to the bed and sat down, the mess of emotions of the last several minutes finally driving all strength from his legs. "Oh Light. I thank you for this day, but I must ask you to try and avoid them in the future. I don't think my heart could take it."

"Wimp." Rielle said, stepping over to the window and drawing the curtain closed.

"Hey, I just went through thinking my girl was dead because of a clerical error spat up from the Nether itself, remembering her, trying to make peace with her memory, finding out she's NOT dead, being given the impression that despite that she doesn't want me any more, and then having a moment when the truth of that has been revealed. I think that falls under 'understandable weariness'."

"That, or you've been slacking off since we last met."

"Slacking? I'm here, aren't I? I'm wearing the Argent Crusade's fine-crafted clothing, aren't…oh bugger this itches!" Zackel said, standing up and pulling at his robe, getting it off his body before tossing it on a chair and sitting back down on the bed in his other clothing beneath.

"You get used to it." Rielle said, turning back around. "So, I guess that means our moment is over and we can get down to brass tacks."

"…I'm too tired to decide whether I'm supposed to say yes or no." Zackel said, leaning back on the bed as he covered his face with his hands.

"Works for me." Rielle said. A sudden series of clattering noises caused Zackel to sit up again, only to find that Rielle's armor was now scattered on the ground around her. As Zackel would later find out, said armor sets had an enchantment that allowed for near-instant removal should it be needed, due to injury or whatnot.

"So then, here's what we're going to do." Rielle said, stepping out of her armored boots. "First we're going to go to the nicest restaurant in Dalaran. Then you're going to pay for every single dish while I indulge in the fine venison I know said restaurant recently got."

"Is it too late to go back to the crucial period where we could have broken up so I can run away?" Zackel murmured.

"Yes, pretty much. You're stuck with me mage, and once you're done buying me dinner, you can move on to buying me some gems. My new axe needs a little extra magical oomph and my own pocketbook is near empty." Rielle said, reaching behind her head and removing the magical pin that kept her hair bound up, letting it fall over her shoulders.

"So's mine."

"Liar. I saw how you moved around the room, or rather how you moved to keep your heavy money-pouch from falling off your belt. I don't know how you made so much coin, but I'll darn sure be _making _sure you spend it properly. On me."

"Dalaran's full of drug addicts. I got in when there didn't seem to be any alchemists in town and a whole bunch of people wanted potions and oils for their equipment and I likely won't ever have that chance again and you're spending all my money and oh Light suddenly all the downsides I was ignoring are crystallizing in my head again."

"Oh no, that will happen once we're done that and I work on properly whipping you back into shape. Then we can storm Icecrown Citadel, beat the crap out of Arthas, and when we've done that we can take over the world."

"Of course." Zackel murmured into his hand.

"Are you listening to a word I'm saying Zack?"

"Yeah yeah, buy Arthas venison, beat the crap out of gems, etc etc." Zackel said. He was about to switch from sarcasm to genuine questions when Rielle sat in his lap.

"But…before all that…" Rielle said, tracing a hand over Zackel's blue hair. The sarcastic humor had left her face, replaced with soft gratitude and joy. Looking at the Draenei, Zackel felt all the poisonous aftermath of his emotional wringer fully drain away. The dice had had one last bounce in them after all, and on the most crucial toss he'd ever made, it had come up with seven.

If that was the good number. Zackel's game-experiences didn't really include dice.

"All my experiences have been in tents and in the field. I've…never had someone to make love with in a bed before." Rielle said. "That…I want first. And more than anything else."

"…What if I have a headache?"

Rielle laughed softly before flicking the mage's forehead.

"Ah, you stupid mage…" Rielle said. "But you're MY stupid mage."

"…And you, Rielle, are the best idea I've ever had." Zackel said.

Rielle leaned down, and as their lips met, Zackel gestured behind him, closing the door to his room with a bang.

"_Come feed the rain_

'_Cause I'm thirsty for your love_

_Dancing underneath the skies of lust._

_Yeah, feed the rain_

'_Cause without your love my life_

_Ain't nothing but this carnival of rust."_

**88888**

"_The cruel, hot summer_

_Led into the long, hard fall,_

_Becoming the dark, killing winter,_

_Until spring replenished us all."_

_**THE (REAL) END

* * *

**_

(Music starts up as the credits roll…)

_**And so this story ends. For now, you can read my side-story 'Feat of Clay', but in addition to that I would like to thank…**_

Rielle: WHAT IS THIS SHIT?

_**Excuse me?**_

Rielle: The story already ended! What's this second ending undoing the first one! Some people LIKED the first one! What gives?

_**Uh…well I wanted to defy expectations…**_

Rielle: You mean you wanted to have your cake and eat it too.

_**No! Well…yes, but I'd also like to note I hate the Woman In Refrigerators Syndrome…**_

Rielle: Yeah yeah yeah. Whatever, you wimp!

_**You'd think you'd be more appreciative…**_

Rielle: I might if you weren't being so sneaky about it…and wait ANOTHER minute! What credits? What music?

_**Wait what?**_

Rielle: I SAID, what credits? What music?

_**Oh for the love of…use your imagination!**_

Zackel: Imagination? You mean like the readers should have to figure out the bait and switch ending?

_**Oh not you too. I was just trying to SURPRISE them…**_

Rielle: Oh look the author pulled a bullshit fakeout into the obligatory happy ending. How edgy and new!

_**Why are you doing this, you got what you wanted, why are you…**_

Rielle: Why? Because this 'credits music' that only I can hear is stupid generic tribal-esque nonsense! I'm sorry, am I really a Tauren?

_**You're being difficult…**_

Rielle: No, THIS is being difficult! Hey guys, the author decided to give us 'credits music' without lyrics! Let's provide some! Zackel, go!

_**You are not actually…**_

Zackel: (singing along to the 'music' ) Pow-Wow The Indian Boy, loved all the animals and the woods!

Rielle/Zackel: WE WILL, WE WILL ROCK YOU!

_**Knock it off you-**_

Zackel: TOSS!

Rielle: Well they ran through the briars and they ran through the brambles, and they ran through the places where a rabbit wouldn't go!

Jasciona: Gypsies, tramps and thieves! We heard it from the people of the town! TOSS!

Daldion: High on a hill lived a lonely goatherd, Ladee-yodel-ladee-yodel-la-hee-hoo!

Silonna: Here comes Santa Claus, here comes Santa Claus, right down Santa Claus Lane! TOSS!

Zuijizra: Give it away, give it away, give it away now! Give it away, give it away, give it away now!

Prigak: I've got a brand new pair of rollerskates, you've got a brand new key! TOSS!

Sparse: Admiral Halsey notified me, he had to have a bath or he couldn't get to sleep!

Adaric: And the cat's in the cradle and the silver spoon, Little Boy Blue and the man in the moon!

Ninos: In your Easter bonnet, with all the frills upon it!

Mug'thol: One night in Bangkok makes a strong man crumble!

Grel'borg: Chicks and ducks and geese better scurry, when I take you out in a surrey!

_**STOP IT….**_

Star of Xil'yeh: We were merely freshmen!

_**THAT'S IT, OUT! GET OUT!**_

All Characters: OH SUSANNA! OH DON'T YOU CRY FOR ME!

_**OUT! OUT!**_

All Characters: (while leaving) 'CAUSE I COME FROM ALABAMMY WITH A BANJO ON MY KNEE! TOSS!

_**Most of the readers won't even get this pa-**_

Rielle: (runs back in and changes the music) YOINK! (runs off as new music starts)

_**That's it I'm out of here.

* * *

**_

_Sankyuu made to iimitera koto chigau Ja nai?  
Chotto dake sugao misete keredo__…  
Dareka no sei ni shite wa nigekae,  
Kure shiteru hibi ate ni naranai wa  
I__'__m sorry toriaezu sayonara_

_Anata ga inai toriai atteieru wagamama!  
(Zutto klenal you ni, kessanal you ni!)  
Aijou yuujoi shiritai koto wa nandemo!  
(Aimal sugite wa karakai yo!)  
Itsuka kokoro no kagi wo kowasu yo na!_

_Anata ga inai toriai atteieru wagamama!  
(Zutto klenal you ni, kessanal you ni!)  
Aijou yuujoi shiritai koto wa nandemo!  
(Aimal sugite wa karakai yo!)  
Itsuka kokoro no oku no doa wo kataku,  
Anata wo matteiru!  
Hokani wa nani mo iranaiaiaiya!  
Ashita mo shinjiteitaiaiaiaiya!

* * *

_

_**The Exodar.**_

Irenus woke with unusual calmness, which was even more alarming considering why he had woken up. He took a moment to put on a robe before he set off through the Draenei's ship-turned-city, passing through the Seat of the Naaru and through the Vault of Lights at a steady, fast clip.

The Shields of Velen knew the Draenei, but Irenus submitted himself to an inspection anyway. Coming up clean, Irenus made his way up the stairway and to the small perch where the leader of all Draenei spent most of his time.

"Prophet." Irenus said, bowing slightly.

"I know that this day, I am not the only one." Velen said, looking out over the Exodar another moment before turning to his fellow. "I sense you have seen something."

"I have Velen. But I am not sure what to make of it."

"You think I will. Perhaps. Speak, please." Velen said.

"Well…I saw the sky. And I saw…a hole in it."

"A hole?"

"Well, a crack. Like the sky had…shattered, split open. I could sense that something was coming through it. And I heard a voice."

Velen nodded.

"It spoke three things. The first was somewhat obscured, but I believe it said 'We are such little men'. The second was clearer. It said 'Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies.'"

"And the third?"

"Well, I'm not sure what it said. I couldn't place it as any of the languages on Azeroth or beyond that I knew. As best I can recall, it said 'Vae Victus'."

Velen, having been stroking his beard, stopped at the last two words.

"…Prophet?"

"…I have heard these words too, recently, in my own visions. I only noted them for their strangeness, but believed it to be merely a part of the dream I was having, rather than my premonition aspect of them. With what you have told me, though…perhaps this is not the case."

"What do you think it means, Prophet?"

"I do not yet know enough to say…but I would venture that the sky breaking means nothing good." Velen said. "Perhaps the Legion is setting a new plot in motion with the siege we are laying to Northrend. Perhaps something else. I shall seek more information. Inform me if you have any more such visions, Irenus. Even if I have had them myself, I will listen."

"I will, Velen." Irenus said. "…though, now that I think of it, there might be something else. There was some chaotic imagery in my own vision, which may have simply been flotsam from my normal dreams, as you thought yours was…but there is one nonsense word that has also re-occurred to me."

"What is it?"

"Xilyeh."

* * *

_**Somewhere**__**…**__**Else.**_

_**So far away. So very very far away.**_

Save for the faint light of the glowing orbs, all was in darkness. In the black oblivion of it, something stirred.

One of the orbs abruptly dimmed, the mild illumination disappearing from within it.

"_**Xil**__**'**__**yeh unit communication terminated. Xil**__**'**__**yeh unit, destroyed.**__**"**_

No eye could have seen the motion within the dark as it gestured. The darkened orb floated up and into the black.

"Show me."

The voice would not have been heard by ears as much as felt by minds, by hearts, by souls. It was a violating reverb, the sound of burning flesh and the skittering echo of psychopathic dreams. Despite all the black around the chamber, the voice was blacker still.

Eyes of omen peered into the orb, and all that it showed. A will commanded, and what had been seen was expanded on, a linking series of interactions that eventually formed the picture of a world.

The smile that emerged on the nightmare's face would have driven the most contented beings to despair. It was a smile of change, change that few could handle and fewer could resist.

"…How…interesting." The voice said. "I believe…we have a winner."

The orb floated back to its spot, even as the nightmare within the dark raised an arm. Power flowed out, uniting with the even greater power all around him. And as he acted, the nightmare pondered what he had seen. What had destroyed Xil'yeh, despite all the gem had offered.

"…The consequences of our actions take us by the scruff of our neck, altogether indifferent to the fact that we have 'improved' in the mean." The voice said. "Perhaps you will find, he that is called a mage…that one is punished most for one's virtues."

The power expanded, reaching every part of what lay around the nightmare. He was in no hurry. It would take time to gather everything. To cross over. To put it all in motion.

But the trumpet would sound, and doom would descend on this world that had drawn his attention. This world that believed that it understood reality. That believed it had seen so much death and horror and destruction. That thought that it had seen their worst visions of oblivion made flesh, in fallen Titans and eldritch abominations, in legions of fire and a king of ice.

Such little men, with little conceptions. They always were.

"Azeroth." The nightmare said, tasting the name. Around him, the remains of a thousand worlds resonated.

Soon.

Soon.

_**THE BEGINNING**_


End file.
